After 66 Covid positive, cruise ship back from Goa, Mumbai tests all aboard

Amitabh Kumar, Director General of Shipping, has ordered Cordelia cruises to stop operations immediately. “I have constituted a committee to investigate this incident. I have also told the operators to halt operations immediately,” he said.

The cruise ship, carrying 2017 passengers, left Mumbai on January 1 and reached Goa the next day where it berthed at the Mormugao Port Trust (MPT) cruise terminal. Port officials said it set sail for Mumbai at 11 pm Monday.

Tests conducted in Goa showed that 66 people on board were Covid-19 positive.

Port officials in Goa said there were arguments when passengers were not allowed to disembark, but matters were resolved before the ship set sail for Mumbai.

The Waterways Leisure Tourism Pvt Ltd, which owns the luxury cruise lines, said the Goa administration had shown “lack of empathy” in not allowing passengers to disembark.

South Goa Collector Ruchika Katyal said there was no disembarkation restriction on passengers who had tested negative, and that 13 passengers had in fact got off the ship.

In a statement issued Tuesday, Jurgen Bailom, CEO and President, Waterways Leisure Tourism Pvt Ltd, said: “It was disheartening to witness lack of empathy on the part of the authorities for neither allowing local residents nor tourists to disembark. The cruise, however, will be bringing them back to Mumbai and scheduling their flights back to Goa. We would also like to state that there were no officials present at the port at the time of this incident. The cruise was merely receiving haphazard instructions from the collector.”

Katyal said port officials, police and officers of the district administration were at the site. She said state government protocols do not bar the entry of persons who test negative for Covid-19.

“Thirteen people who tested negative have stayed back (in Goa) and six who tested positive were admitted to a hospital. When a person is negative, then there is no restriction from our end. It was for the ship to submit as to who wants to get down and whatever details (of negative passengers) we got, we allowed,” Katyal said.

“Some positive people were admitted in the hospital by the ship’s crew but their families wanted to go back. So from the hospital, these positive people were brought back on the ship again. At that time, there must have been some chaos but it was handled at the site,” she said.

Most passengers on board the ship were tourists from Mumbai, Gujarat and Delhi.

MPT Deputy Chairman G P Rai said the cruise liner reached Goa around 11 am on January 2 but was brought into the port by 8 pm. After a crew member tested positive and was taken to a medical facility in Goa, all passengers on board were tested.

On Monday afternoon, RT-PCR tests confirmed that 66 passengers were Covid positive.

“There was a lot of discussion whether to allow or not allow the passengers to disembark. Then six people (who were positive) stayed in hospital and the others were asked to go back. Thirteen people said that they don’t want to go back to Mumbai and stayed back. Then, at about 11 am (on January 3), the ship departed for Mumbai,” Rai said.