Royal Caribbean captain given heave-ho?

If you've been following the ongoing saga of Royal Caribbean's Brilliance of the Seas, the ship that chucked people and stuff around enough to make headlines, we have a new development in the story. It seems that the ships captain is no longer at the helm.

"Captain Erik Tengelsen has been placed on voyage leave so he may participate in the after-action review into of the severe ship movement Brilliance of the Seas," Royal Caribbean spokeswoman Cynthia Martinez told CruiseCritic.com. "Captain Henrik Sorensen, who was already scheduled to relieve Tengelsen on January 10, took command of the ship on Friday, December 17."

Gadling reported earlier that "passengers, furniture, and pretty much anything not tied down went flying back and forth as the ship was tossed around by inclement affecting the middle east."

Later we told you that Royal Caribbean had stepped up and done the right thing, refunding the cruise fare of all those on board, providing a generous onboard credit and caring for the 30-some guests with minor injuries.

As the story developed, AOL Travel let us know that it was actually more than 100 guests injured at later count but that all were doing fine.

Yesterday, we heard from maritime attorney and perpetual pain-in-the-cruise-lines-neck Jim Walker who wasn't buying any of it saying "RCCL has pulled this stunt time and time again, quickly issuing misleading statements in the hope that the media will quote its carefully crafted misinformation and then the story will quickly blow over"

Let's hope Captain Tengelsen has not had to walk the plank.

Flickr photo by xJasonRogersx

Filed under: United States, Caribbean