A passenger on Royal Caribbean's Symphony of the Seas owes their life to first responders after going overboard following the ship’s departure from Barcelona on Sunday. The incident was first reported on Facebook by a user purporting to be aboard Symphony of the Seas, who wrote that an emergency "Oscar, Oscar, Oscar" distress call, the ship’s code for “man overboard” went out shortly after 11 p.m. on Sunday. It was the first night of a two-week voyage.
The incident was further documented on social media by another passenger who posted a video on X (formerly Twitter), which captured footage taken from his balcony of spotlights and rescue boats out on the water. In a second video, he recorded the loudspeaker announcement informing the ship’s contingent that the lost passenger had been recovered from the water and was receiving medical care.
A Royal Caribbean spokesperson confirmed to Insider that this presumed accident had, indeed occurred on the night of October 29. The precise details remain unclear and the authenticity of these firsthand accounts were unable to be independently verified. The company spokesperson declined to provide further information about the incident,out of respect for the privacy of the guests involved.
"The ship and crew immediately reported the incident to local authorities and began searching for the guest. Thankfully, the guest was successfully recovered and was brought on board," the spokesperson said. "Symphony of the Seas is continuing on its transatlantic sailing as planned," they added.
Instances of passengers going overboard cruise ships are rare, with data showing that 212 such incidents occurred between 2009 and 2019, as reported by the Cruise Lines International Association. The swift success of the rescue efforts in this case also makes it an unusual case, since less than one-third of those (28.2 percent) recorded during that 10-year period resulted in successful rescues.
Cruise Vessel Security and Safety Act (CVSSA), passed by Congress in 2010, mandates that cruise ships employ technologies, "that can be used for capturing images of passengers or detecting passengers who have fallen overboard, to the extent that such technology is available."
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