Charter Boat Cap't Arrested for DUI while operating Boat! Really? What an idiot!

The captain of our cruise ship (Norwegian Dream) was allegedly drinking and entertaining a woman friend while transiting the Montevideo harbor channel when in broad daylight the ship rammed a barge, sinking several containers and SUVs, and damaging the ship's bow. After repair, the voyage continued under a different captain.



Bizarre Crash Strands Norwegian Dream, Celebrity Infinity - Norwegian Cruise Line

Costa Concordia..? Deja vu all over again..?

This guy was just drinking/BUI...he hadn't hit anything yet.

Like a lot of functional drinkers...unless someone speaks up...they can go a whole career without being stopped....makes you wonder if all those charts and suspicions being cast elsewhere are as scientific as many believe.

Once again I find myself asking why I would ever want to spend money so I can be a piece of self-loading cargo.

Sisuitl said:

Once again I find myself asking why I would ever want to spend money so I can be a piece of self-loading cargo.

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Maybe not you...but 99% of the population would never enjoy as much of the water as many of us without paying per trip.

Just like the airlines and many other pretty routine, yet public safety type jobs...alcoholism creeps in when the routine of the task overcomes the "sanity" of the operator. Many go for years, even careers and are never relieved of their duties because functional alcoholism or even just the ability to DO the job impaired year after year never results in anything going wrong unless someone points it out to authorities.

Yeah I completely agree with you. I remember that my uncle when he worked with a DUI lawyer told me such a case where a captain at the end of his career was charged with drinking while on duty and he pleaded to doing it whole of his life.

Back in the 60s, my dad, who was not much of a drinker used to claim that half of the captains on the ore carriers were half in the bottle about half of the time. He was probably about half right.

Times were a bit different then, even on the highways. The run from upper Superior to the lower lakes every week for 25 years was a pretty monotonous job, even if it paid pretty well. He claimed it was sometimes difficult to keep captains on that job.

He was not overly critical of them as he understood the difficultly of the job and being away from home most of the year. He just did not appreciate having them in that state when on duty.

Same reason for the older generation airline pilots and train engineers.....though something can go wrong at any moment....boredom nibbles at the mind and a little buzz made it bearable. Might still be an issue...but not as bad I don't think.

I wonder about some bridge tenders.....when the boat traffic exceeds the road traffic and they have an off season and only open occasionally....AND you work by yourself with little or no public interaction....what a setup to drink or do drugs.

psneeld said:

I wonder about some bridge tenders.....when the boat traffic exceeds the road traffic and they have an off season and only open occasionally....AND you work by yourself with little or no public interaction....what a setup to drink or do drugs.

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Valid point. When I left Baltimore in '97, shortly before was a story of the only opening of the Hanover Street bridge that year. The bridge tender had to be there daily, but with only one opening in a year, was mentally distraught. I think the bridge is no longer tended.

Unfortunately there are a lot of captains with drinking problems. I attribute some to the schedules they have. Other crew tends to take advantage of opportunities and go party, often overdoing it. However, Captains, as bosses of the crew tend to not fraternize with the others and in keeping separate often are alone and then get in the habit of just drinking by themselves each night. It's hard for them to have families and relationships when many are away from home 6 months at a time.


But then I also knew many people on the lake we lived on who wouldn't think of operating a car under the influence but loaded the coolers and drank heavily every weekend on the boat as if somehow that was more acceptable.