Cruise ship passengers from Collinsville glad to be on land
BY RHETT MORGAN World Staff Writer
Saturday, February 16, 2013
2/16/13 at 7:28 AM
After five days of eating vegetable sandwiches and pooping in baggies, Carla Brown of Collinsville said she's looking forward to some normalcy.
"A hot shower would be really, really nice - and a good night's sleep," Brown, sitting in a bus in New Orleans, said Friday in a telephone interview.
Brown and her husband, Kenny Brown, were among the roughly 4,200 people aboard Carnival cruise ship Triumph, which was pulled ashore in Mobile, Ala., by tugboats Thursday.
Passengers on the 14-story vessel had endured five days of sleep deprivation, food shortages and hygienic humiliation after an engine-room blaze left the ship disabled for five days in the Gulf of Mexico.
The couple was expected back in Oklahoma about suppertime Saturday.
"The staff did everything they could have done," Carla Brown said.
Brown, who works for Collinsville-based Verdigris Valley Electric Cooperative, was on the cruise with relatives, as well as with the family of another Verdigris Valley employee, Darrell White. She said the couple's biggest complaint was Carnival's delay in deciding a course of action after the fire.
"I believe it was probably about 10 hours before they ever ordered tugboats," she said.
Passengers were forced to accept having to relieve themselves in plastic bags, and breakfast ranged from dry cereal to cold waffles, Carla Brown said. But plenty of fruit was available.
"When they said we had avocado or onion sandwiches, that's truly what we had," she said. "It may not have been what you paid for or what you thought you were going to get, but nobody went hungry."
Cruise line representatives, however, did their best to mitigate the horrible conditions, the couple said.
"A lot of people are knocking them down," Kenny Brown said. "But from what the conditions were, they did a good job. Our cabin steward, she worked 20 hours a day."
For their trouble, Triumph passengers will get a refund, vouchers for another cruise and $500 compensation, Kenny Brown said. He and his wife are already planning for another Carnival vacation.
A cruise they booked previously departs March 4.
Original Print Headline: Collinsville couple happy to get off cruise ship
Rhett Morgan 918-581-8395
rhett.morgan@tulsaworld.com
