Puerto Rico

Coast Guard Suspends Search for Missing Royal Caribbean Passenger

The U.S. Coast Guard has suspended its search for a man who jumped onto a lifeboat on the side of a cruise ship before he plunged into the ocean.

In a tweet Saturday, the Coast Guard announced it would cease rescue operations after crews had searched an area covering 931 square nautical miles.

Fellow passengers watched in horror Friday as the man, only identified as a 35-year-old passenger from Brazil, clung to the edge of a lifeboat for more than a minute before plunging into the ocean below. It wasn't clear why the man jumped toward the lifeboat or how he came to cling at its side.

Royal Caribbean said the man was on the seventh deck of the massive Oasis of the Seas when he apparently jumped onto the life boat one deck below. 

Man Overboard
Darren Libman
An Oasis of the Sea rescue boat in the water.

The U.S. Coast Guard said it received a report of the incident about 1 a.m. and was searching for the man. The fall came as the ship sailed near the Bahamas.

The cruise line said in a statement that it's supporting the man's family, but calls and emails for further comment weren't immediately returned.

In a short video clip briefly posted to YouTube and taken down hours later shows several people looking on, apparently trying to help as the man clings to the tiny vessel. One man screams, "Hold on to him, don't let him go,'' and says he won't go away until the man is back onboard. A woman tells everyone to stop yelling because people are trying to help him.

The clinging passenger appears to look toward the deck in the seconds before falling into the water. The woman says she can see him in the water, "He's there!'' and tells people to get a lifesaving flotation device to toss to him. "Throw it over!'' she says. The video then ends.

It was unclear who took the video, but it appears to be shot from a higher deck.

The Oasis of the Seas sails to the Caribbean from Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale. The ship had left Saturday on a seven-day trip.

In a tweet early Friday, the Coast Guard said they were searching for the man roughly 80 nautical miles north of port city of Managuan in the Bahamas.

The Coast Guard said it immediately sent a C-130 plane from Clearwater, Florida, to begin searching for the man. An MH-60 helicopter joined the search at daybreak, and the cruise ship sent two search boats to look for the man.

Passenger Carmen Edelson, a travel blogger with Carmen's Luxury Travel, said she was awakened around 1 a.m. Friday when the ship began to turn around and the loudspeaker announced that a man had gone overboard. A short time later, crews in lifeboats dropped down to the water as lights shined down from above.

"It was a crazy night,'' Edelson said.

The ship resumed its course around 8 a.m. as the Coast Guard continued to search, she added.

The area around the man's room was closed off later, but the ship was otherwise running normally, Edelson said. "Everybody here is trying to have a good time, but in the back of our minds, we're still thinking about this incident,'' Edelson said.

Asked to confirm the passenger's account, Royal Caribbean did not immediately respond to an email requesting comment.

Copyright AP - Associated Press
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