May 28 Photo Brief: Fire on Grandeur of the Seas, baby rescued from sewage pipe, France’s first victim of Coronavirus dies
Fire on Grandeur of the Seas cruise ship, baby rescued from sewage pipe in China, France’s first victim of Coronavirus dies and more in today’s daily brief. ATTENTION: VISUAL COVERAGE OF INJURY SCENES
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- The Taj Mahal is seen through an archway from the East on May 28, 2013 in Agra, India. Completed in 1643, the mausoleum was built by the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan in memory of his third wife, Mumtaz Mahal, who is buried there alongside Jahan. (Daniel Berehulak/Getty Images)
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- This picture taken on May 24, 2013 shows Wu Yuanhong, a mentally disabled man, sitting in his cage at his home in Lijiachong village in Ruichang, China’s Jiangxi province. Yuanhong has been locked in the cage by his parents for the past 11 years, after he allegedly beat a 13-year-old child to death, media reported. (AFP/Getty Images)
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- Afghanistan National Army (ANA) soldiers take part in an exercise at the ANA training centre in Herat on May 27, 2013. International troops in Afghanistan and all NATO-led combat forces are due to leave by the end of 2014, when Kabul will assume responsibility for the country’s security. Some 300,000 Afghan Army and Police personnel have been trained so far. (Aref Karimi/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Members of the drug squad arrest suspected users and drug dealers during a raid on a drugs den in Abidjan on May 28, 2013. The number of drug users has increased exponentially in the capital with many cartels using West Africa as a transit point for narcotics from Latin America to Europe and Asia. (Issouf Sanogo/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Policemen wearing civilian clothes arrest a far-right protester on May 26, 2013 in Paris on the sidelines of demonstrations against a gay marriage law. France on May 18 became the 14th country to legalize same-sex marriage after President Francois Hollande signed the measure into law following months of bitter debate and demonstrations. (Fred Dufour/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Members of the press watch as Marine One with US President Barack Obama takes off from the South Lawn of the White House on May 28, 2013 in Washington. Obama is traveling to the New Jersey shore to survey rebuilding efforts in areas effected by last year’s hurricane Sandy. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Damage on the Royal Caribbean ship Grandeur of the Seas is pictured as the ship is docked in Freeport May 27, 2013. A fire broke out on the ship’s aft mooring deck in the early hours of Monday morning. The fire was extinguished at 0458 ET, and all 2,224 passengers and 796 crew members were safe and accounted for, according to the company. (Vandyke Hepburn/Reuters)
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- The Philippe Chatrier central court is covered as rain falls on the third day of the French tennis Open at the Roland Garros stadium in Paris on May 28, 2013. (Kenzo Tribouillard/AFP/Getty Images)
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- This frame grab taken from AFPTV footage received on May 28, 2013 shows rescue workers breaking away bits of a pipe to remove a newborn baby boy stuck inside in the city of Jinhua, in the eastern province of Zhejiang. The newborn baby boy was rescued from a sewage pipe in a Chinese apartment building after being flushed down a toilet, state media said, provoking online outrage on May 28. (AFPTV/AFP/Getty Images)
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- On May 29, 2013, it will be 60 years since Sir Edmund Hillary and Nepalese Sherpa Tenzing Norgay became the first to reach the summit of Mount Everest on the Nepal-Tibet border. (Ron Burton/Getty Images)
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- Amazon Indians occupy the main construction site of the Belo Monte hydroelectric dam in Vitoria do Xingu, near Altamira in Para State, May 27, 2013. Indians from various tribes returned to force the suspension for the second time in a month, of the dam projected to become the world’s third largest in energy production, opposing it for its impact on the environment and their livelihoods. (Lunae Parracho/Reuters)
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- This undated handout picture courtesy of the British Health Protection Agency shows the Coronavirus seen under an electron miscroscope. France’s first victim of a SARS-like virus, a 65-year-old man thought to have contracted in Dubai, has died, health officials said on May 28, 2013.(HO/AFP/Getty Images)
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- A worker harvests cannabis plants at a plantation near the northern town of Nazareth May 28, 2013. Marijuana is an illegal drug in Israel. Medicinal use of it was first permitted in 1993, according to the health ministry. Today cannabis is used in Israel to treat 11,000 people suffering from illnesses such as cancer, Parkinson’s, multiple sclerosis, Crohn’s disease and post traumatic stress disorder, according to Israel’s health ministry. (Amir Cohen/Reuters)
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- Citizen Christine Brubaker holds a cake that she made for Toronto Mayor Rob Ford that reads “Happy Birthday Rob Please Resign” on his 44th birthday at City Hall in Toronto, May 28, 2013. Two top aides quit Toronto Mayor Rob Ford’s office on Monday as the embattled leader of Canada’s biggest city faces lingering allegations he was caught smoking crack cocaine on video, accusations he has firmly denied. (Mark Blinch/Reuters)
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- Ethnic Miao boy Gun Diuliang, 10, knocks his gun with the back of a knife to tamp down the gunpowder before a shooting practice in the village of Basha in Congjiang county, Guizhou province, May 21, 2013. (Jason Lee/Reuters)
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- Boys jump into a canal during a hot day in New Delhi May 27, 2013. India’s monsoon rains may arrive on the southern Kerala coast around June 3, a late debut that will raise fears any revival for drought-hit tracts of southern and western farmland could be delayed. (Anindito Mukherjee/Reuters)
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- A girl plays on May 28, 2013 with soap bubbles during the Share Drive of Life charity event organized by the Kiev Chapter Ukraine motorcycling club for children with autism in a park in Kiev. The number of children with various forms of autism in Ukraine increased over the past five years by 2.35 times, and 2,791 children were under the supervision of child psychiatrists in 2012. (Sergei Supinsky/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Belarus Border Guards celebrate their agency’s day in Minsk on May 28, 2013. (Viktor Drachev/AFP/Getty Images)
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- Shinnyo-en Buddhist monks and devotees place lanterns on the water during a ceremony marking remembrance and reflection on Memorial Day, and to honor victims of war, famine, and natural disasters at Ala Moana beach park in Honolulu, Hawaii May 27, 2013. (Hugh Gentry/Reuters)
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- Lights shine on the tops of crosses making up a memorial outside the Plaza Towers elementary school where seven children died and several students and teachers were injured by the May 20 afternoon tornado in Moore, Oklahoma May 26, 2013. The tornado was the strongest in the United States in nearly two years and cut a path of destruction 17 miles (27 km) long and 1.3 (2 km) miles wide. (Lucas Jackson/Reuters)
Cruise canceled after fire aboard Royal Caribbean ship
By John-John Williams IV, The Baltimore Sun
9:50 p.m. EDT, May 27, 2013
Bang Warren dismissed the pounding on her cabin door early Monday morning as “children playing a prank.” Then a horn blared and she heard people running through the halls of the Grandeur of the Seas
A fire had broken out in the early morning hours aboard the Royal Caribbean International cruise ship that sailed from Baltimore for the Bahamas on Friday.
“Crew members told us to get our life vest on,” recalled Warren, a White Marsh resident. “We asked if we could throw on clothes real quick. They told us we didn’t have enough time for that.”
The ship was 35 nautical miles northwest of West End, Bahamas, according to the Coast Guard, which dispatched three cutters and two aircraft to aid the ship. All 2,224 passengers and 796 crew have been accounted for, and no injuries have been reported, the company said in a statement.
The fire started at 2:50 a.m. in an aft mooring area — where the lines that tie the ship to shore are stowed — and was extinguished at 4:58 a.m., said Cynthia Martinez, a spokeswoman for Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. Martinez did not disclose the cause of the fire.
The Coast Guard said the fire spread to a crew lounge a deck above the mooring area. The fire will be investigated by the Coast Guard and the National Transportation Safety Board.
The ship, bound for CoCoCay, Bahamas, was diverted to Freeport, Bahamas, for evaluation.
After assessing the damage, Royal Caribbean announced late Monday afternoon that it cancelled the remainder of the voyage. The company said it would issue full refunds to each passenger and arrange flights for all of them back to Baltimore on Tuesday. Each passenger also would receive a certificate for a future cruise.
The company also announced it was canceling the next cruise on the ship, which was set to sail from Baltimore on May 31. It said it would provide an update regarding future sailings “as soon as the information is available.”
After being roused from her cabin, a shoeless Warren ran to the assembly area where she was told lifeboats were being readied in case the ship needed to be evacuated.
“It was very surreal,” said Warren, who estimated she waited on deck with other guests for more than four hours before being allowed to return to her cabin. “The frightening part was when they started lowering the life boats. A lot of people were passing out with fear. The crew was running up and down the deck with oxygen. I know some children were vomiting. A lot of very young children were crying.”
The passengers and crew were called to assembly stations as a precaution before the fire was extinguished, Royal Caribbean said on its website.
“The guests were asked to go to their muster or assembly stations, which is the area where they assemble in the event of an emergency,” Martinez wrote in an email to The Baltimore Sun. “They did not board lifeboats.”
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