Almost five disastrous days after suffering from an engine fire on the Carnival Cruise Ship "Triumph" in the Gulf of Mexico, more than 4,200 exhausted passengers on board the Carnival "Triumph" disaster have finally returned to land in Mobile, Alabama.
Unfortunately, this cruise ship fire was not a rare event. Regrettably, cruise ship fires occur with alarming frequency.
More than 10 cruise ship fires have made news between the Carnival Triumph’s latest problems and an engine room fire that disabled the Carnival Splendor in November 2010.
One of the reasons cruising is so affordable is because major cruise lines are incorporated in foreign countries, enabling them to avoid U.S. federal taxes, labor laws and safety regulations. Employees work long hours for low wages; a cleaner, for example, might earn only $156 a week with no tips. See below, "The Jones Act".
And cruise lines make money when the ships are operating. Taking a ship out of commission for maintenance costs money. The cruise lines push the ships just as hard as they push their crew members.
Cruise ships are inspected by countries where they dock. The U.S. Coast Guard Marine conducts annual cruise ship inspections, but the agency is “underfunded and understaffed,” making adequate inspections of all the cruise ships nearly impossible.
The Jones Act
There are some individuals who use the occasion of these cruise ship incidents to attack "The Jones Act":
The Merchant Marine Act of 1920 (P.L. 66-261) , "The Jones Act", is a United States federal statute that regulates maritime commerce in U.S. waters and between U.S. ports. Section 27, better known as the Jones Act, deals with cabotage (i.e., coastal shipping) and requires that all goods transported by water between U.S. ports be carried in U.S.-flag ships, constructed in the United States, owned by U.S. citizens, and crewed by U.S. citizens and U.S. permanent residents.
As global trade increased and the ability to finance overseas corporations correspondingly increased, there appeared loopholes in US Law by which large shipping and maritime companies could circumvent US Labor and Trade laws and regulations by using cheap labor, impressed labor, and even indentured labor from poor undeveloped countries as well as build ships using similar labor, thereby lowering costs whilst capturing the profit differential at the expense of US shipbuilders and sailors.
Consequently, the purpose of the law is to support the U.S. maritime industry.
[www.abajournal.com/news/article/ "Cruise ship fires occur with 'alarming frequency'"/2-15-2013; www.1800jonesact.com/JonesAct/USCTitle46; "U.S. Issues Blanket Jones Act Waiver For Fuel Tankers After Sandy", www.reuters.com/article/2012-11-02]
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