Stops To Check If Passenger Overboard
The Carnival Glory Cruise Ship docked in the Belize City harbor this
morning but for a while, none of its passengers could disembark.
It happened at around 7:30 in the vicinity of the One Man Caye Channel
after a security guard spotted a body floating near the ship. The
incident threw the entire vessel into crisis mode thinking it could be
a case of a passenger overboard.
The cruise ship deployed its rescue vessel to recover the body - and a
visual inspection confirmed that it was not a passenger - but a man of
Hispanic descent, who has been classified as a John Doe of Belizean
origin.
At this time multiple sources have told us that it is the body of a
fisherman and former watchman who was well known in both of the city's
two major Co-op's And while we have a name we can't report on it until
family members have been reliably informed of the death.
This afternoon we spoke to The BTB Director of Cruise, Abil Castaneda
about the freak event that threw the city's cruise terminals into flux:
Abil Castaneda - Director, Responsible for Cruise
"After the incident transpired after around 7 o'clock this morning
there is some protocol that must be put in place by the cruise line,
anytime an incident like that happens there is an emergency protocol
for in the event that anybody fell overboard, so what happens in that
case that they have scramble their emergency teams, local authorities
were also brought on the ship to investigate what was happening, while
all of that is happening, no cruise passenger can come off the ship and
so all in all, what it led to was 3 hours of delay in having our cruise
passengers tender off and come on to shore to do their tours and to
visit their destination. Approximately about half of the tours that
were scheduled off that particular ship has been affected, some of them
let to cancellations as well."
The Belize Port Authority along with the Belize Police Department and
Belize Coast Guard, did go onboard to make their own checks.
No injuries were observed on the body and at this time no foul play is
suspected. The body was transported to the Belize National Forensic
Science Service morgue to await a postmortem examination.
Tourism Minister Comments on Cruise Passenger Overboard
This afternoon, we spoke to Tourism Minister Anthony Mahler, about the
discovery of this body which caused those logistical delays for the
cruise industry this morning. He told us what he knew based on his
debriefings from officials within the Ministry of Tourism:
Daniel Ortiz
"Can you share any information on that particular situation that maybe
any briefing you've received on it?"
Hon. Anthony Mahler - Minister of Tourism & Diaspora Relations
"I've been back and forth with port and other agencies early this
morning, my people have been briefing me up to the minute and it has
been established that the body was found is a Belizean man and not
somebody off the cruise ship, there was some delay in terms of
embarkations of the cruise ship passengers but they are on their way
now for their tours and things like that."
Channel 7
AmbergrisCaye.com 
