The Carnival Freedom cruise ship suffered its second fire in less than two years, with passenger footage showing smoke and flames coming from the ship’s exhaust funnel on Saturday afternoon.
X user @breezebreeze_ can be heard saying, “That’s weird,” while showing a fire on the ship.
Carnival Cruise Line responded with several tweets regarding the incident, which allegedly occurred at 3:15 ET.
One of the posts said, “Carnival Freedom has reported a fire on the port side of the ship’s exhaust funnel.” “The ship was located 32 miles off the coast of Eleuthera Island in the Bahamas and was headed to Freeport after a port call at Princess Cay was canceled due to weather.”
Following the news, passengers on the ship leaving Port Canaveral on Monday contacted the cruise line to confirm that their itinerary would proceed as planned.
“Is the Carnival Freedom cruise still scheduled to depart from Port Canaveral on March 25th?” one X user asked Carnival. “I want to know this for traveling!”
@breezebreeze_ via Storyful
Another X user wrote that the next planned cruise was “almost certain to be cancelled.” “Ironically, this is not the first time something like this has happened to this ship, and at that time further sailings were cancelled, although this has obviously not been confirmed.”[ed]”
Carnival quickly responded to quell the rumors, saying it does not expect the next Carnival Freedom voyage to be affected.
In May 2022, a fire broke out in the exhaust funnel of the Freedom ship while it was anchored off Grand Turk Island in the Turks and Caicos Islands. Video from the time also showed the ship’s funnel, also known as the whale’s tail, being destroyed by flames and smoke.
The Crown Cruise Vacations website said the part of the ship where the fire occurred was designed to divert the flow of exhaust gases away from the ship.
Carnival said of Saturday’s fire, “The ship’s fire response team immediately swung into action, and the captain also directed the ship toward heavy rain in the area to maximize firefighting efforts.” “Witnesses reported a possible lightning strike and an investigation is currently underway.”
Carnival said the captain “made multiple announcements to guests and crew” about the fire. The port side of the funnel fell onto deck 10, Carnival said. No injuries were reported.
Carnival Freedom was held in Freeport as scheduled on Sunday, according to Cruise Mapper. Carnival said there were no operational issues with the ship’s systems.
