A cruise liner full of passengers and crew members decided to leave their planned 7-day vacation so they could help victims of Hurricane Dorian in the Bahamas.
The Celebrity Equinox left Fort Lauderdale, Florida with 3,000 guests last weekend with the intention of landing in Nassau at the end of their week-long voyage.
“We have a little army of cooks making food and a little navy of lifeboats and tug boats bringing it ashore,” said Rob Zeiger, a spokesman for Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd., the parent company of Celebrity Cruises.
The ship was diverted to Freeport on Grand Bahama Island, which had been partially destroyed by the storm. The passengers and crew decided to not returning to Florida and turned the trip into a humanitarian mission by preparing, packaging, and serving more than 10,000 sandwiches and water bottles to Bahamians affected by the storm.
The ship’s kitchen staff prepared some 10,000 meals, while guests volunteered to plate and pack them. Even children helped with writing personalized cards to cheer up the victims pitched in, reports NBC News.
In a letter to guests, the cruise line explained: “The Bahamas hold a special place in our hearts as a treasured place for our guests, and home to more than 500 of our colleagues,”
“Now, in the aftermath of Hurricane Dorian, we are rolling up our sleeves to help our friends.”
“If we can go and give meals, that’s the least that we can do,” said Jessica Russell, of Fort Worth, Texas.
“Surely it’s great to be in the Bahamas, but what we’re doing for these people their whole lives, everything they’ve ever had is gone,” she added.
Unicef just announced that more than 1.5 tons of life-saving supplies arrived in Nassau.
“This first supply shipment of UNICEF humanitarian items was freighted by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) and includes over 400,000 water purification tablets, several 5,000-liter tanks for at least 2,000 people and 1,000 jerry cans,” says the organization.
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