Gilligan had it worse

            I was watching 20/20 last Friday night and they had a special about cruise ships.  The lead story was obviously about the Carnival Triumph (aka the shit ship).  They described the conditions that these individuals were living in for their five days on the powerless ship, expanding upon the articles that I had read throughout the week.  These were not stellar conditions to say the least, and definitely not something that you want to experience on your vacation. 

            I don’t want to dwell on the specifics of the conditions too much except to say that as bad as they were, people have survived through worse.  There are people that live in those conditions on a daily basis, and while it is not ideal for a vacation to turn into that, it is hardly the end of the world.  Hell, ask anyone from the Costa Concordia if they would trade spots with you.  At least your ship stayed afloat!  Ask anyone that had their ship attacked by pirates in the Indian Ocean if they would change spots with you.  There are worse things in life than a little shit smell and some sub par food.

            What this post is really about is what is coming next.  You know about the conditions of the cruise, but did you know that as compensation for their ordeal the individuals on the cruise got a full refund on the price of the cruise, a voucher for another cruise in the future and $500.00.  Let’s take that one at a time.

            A full refund:  Considering the fact that there were thousands of people on the cruise, this was probably the biggest blow to Carnival, and even though the passengers got half of their cruise the way they wanted it, they got a full refund.  I’m not sure how many other instances you would see that happen.  If I ate half a pizza and said that it was gross, I wouldn’t expect to get a full refund.  Here, when making customers happy is a number one priority though, it makes at least a little more sense.

            A voucher for another cruise:  I’m not sure how many people will actually take Carnival up on this one, but it is also a pretty penny for the cruise line to dish out.  It may turn out to be an empty gesture, but it’s a gesture nonetheless.

            $500.00:  That’s right.  People actually made money for having a shitty (no pun intended, I promise) time on their vacation.  The law awards people money to “make them whole” in civil suits.  That means that in order to make it up to you, the individual or company that wronged you must provide you with compensation to get you back to where you were before the incident, in this case before the shit cruise.  Technically, that would be limited to the refund, and probably paying for your hotel room in Alabama when you docked (which Carnival did).  The voucher for another cruise can be taken either way because they may never be used, but the $500.00 is above and beyond making people whole.  That’s good business sense and a very nice thing to do in terms of damage control.  By making a grander gesture it looks like you are sorrier than you really are (Kobe Bryant and a giant diamond ring come to mind here).

            Here’s the thing, it won’t end here.  Not by a long shot.  There were probably as many lawyers ready to greet the passengers of that ship as there were television cameras.  The lawsuits will come fast, furious and without merit.  Passengers were made whole and then some, yet they will want more, because in this society we are takers.  We never settle for what we are owed or what we have earned.  We always want more, and other people be damned because of it. 

            This is not to say that a lawsuit may not be warranted for some people in this case but a class-action one that is banking on emotional distress is bullshit.  If someone gets sick to the point of hospitalization and can tie that to the cruise, I can easily see that individual getting Carnival to pay for it.  Aside from that though, people live through massive amounts of emotional distress all the time, people come closer to death than anyone here ever did, and you don’t see them lining up at the nearest lawyer.  What gives someone that had a bad time on their vacation the right to sue the company that provided that experience?  I had a very poor dining experience once and you know what I did after that?  I told everyone about it and refused to eat there again.  Did it sink the company?  No, I’m sure they didn’t care, but it’s one less thing for me to worry about.  This idea that we have to bankrupt a company that wronged us because making us whole “is not enough” is ludicrous. 

            That being said, I have one question about the cruise and the way it was handled (and if this was already addressed and you know the answer or have a link to an article that does, let me know because I am genuinely curious).  If they were able to provide supplies to the Triumph via both helicopter and other cruise ship, why were they unable to remove the people from the Triumph and transfer them to a different boat?  I understand the logistics would have been a nightmare, but they were adrift for five days, you can’t tell me that the only (and apparently best) option was to tow them to Alabama.  What was the thinking when that was brought up in the Carnival boardroom?  Was it too expensive, too much of an inconvenience to other passengers on other boats?  What was it like when those other boats came by to drop off supplies and the people on the shit cruise saw the other passengers living it up on a boat with power?  I’d hate to have been on the good boat at that point, to have thousands of eyes staring you down because you are enjoying your vacation, as if you are the one that shit on their boat and left. 

            In closing, I also want to point out the fact that CBS missed a real opportunity for some reality TV gold here.  Seriously.  You drop Jeff Probst on the shit ship and it’s instantly a Survivor season that everyone will want to watch.  Maybe next time CBS, maybe next time.

Update 2.21:  Well that didn't take too long