ICCL’s president, Michael Crye, and Charlie Mandigo, Director of Fleet Security for Holland America, opened and led the session by focusing on the safety record of the cruise industry in the new age of terrorism. Some of the facts presented were rather eye-opening.  

Cruise ships have been remarkably free from terrorist acts for the last 30 years. Only one passenger death as a result of a terrorist action on board a cruise ship has ever occurred in modern history. In 1985, 69 year-old wheelchair-bound Jewish passenger from New York named Leon Klinghoffer was shot to death by hijackers from the Palestinian Liberation Front who had taken over the cruise ship Achilles Lauro in the Mediterranean. 

There are many reasons for this somewhat impeccable run of security and terror-free good fortune in the cruise industry according to ICCL and cruise line industry officials. To begin, Mr. Mandigo described cruise ships to be, “more in the nature of a floating hotel… rather than as part of the nation’s critical transportation infrastructure. Most likely, a successful attack on a cruise ship would not seriously affect business or commercial travel like a series of public transportation attacks has done in the past.” The terrorists would not thereby readily accomplish one of their most important goals: disruption of the national economy.

Recent research also indicates that terrorists wish to use targets and methods that have been successfully used before and that can easily be taught and replicated. Cruise ships are clearly not in this category.  

Moreover, the high cost of access to a cruise ship is in and of itself an additional security layer. Hijackers simply do not want to pay several thousand dollars to reach and board a luxury cruise ship when they can easily enter a nearby subway station for a few coins and have ready access to huge crowds of soft targets. 

No longer can relatives and friends gather near a cruise ship gangway for a bon voyage or a welcome home. Today, even brief authorized visitors (including media members) to cruise ships must provide security information to the cruise line at least 4 days prior to the intended boarding. The cruise line industry has also implemented multiple security checks for all passengers with up to 5 access control points at many ports. These checkpoints invariably include extensive baggage checks, metal detection and X-rays scans, and passenger verifications and badging that typically start at the streetside door of the port building and continue throughout the entire process of embarkation.  

Photographs of each passenger are taken prior to the initial boarding and then loaded into the ships’ electronic security systems with additional ID information. Each passenger is then given a matching encoded security card that must be used when leaving or reboarding the ship. When a passenger reboards a ship after a port-o’-call, the card is swiped and the ship’s security system shows the photo that is then verified by the cruise security personnel to ensure the face in the computer registry matches that of the presenting passenger. Detailed electronic records are kept for each passenger that boards or disembarks form the ship.

Cruise lines pay special attention to MARSEC (Maritime Security) threat levels, which are similar to the US Department of Homeland Security’s threat levels, but which are set in each seaport by local governmental authorities. Cruise ships have been known to entirely skip ports that have even slightly elevated MARSEC threat levels. These ships are maneuverable, highly self-sufficient and can change itineraries at will. Unlike an aircraft that might be running dangerously low on fuel during a hijacking, a cruise ship can do just fine at a dead stop in the water. Even at the lowest MARSEC threat levels, the cruise lines actively screen 100% of their passengers, luggage and stores.  

Unlike a ferry, no vehicles are loaded aboard cruise ship, thereby obviating an attack by car or truck bomb. Similarly, cruise ships carry no container cargo where large explosive caches could be hidden and later detonated. By their sheer numbers, the many crewmembers on these ships, numbering in the hundreds and even approaching 1,000 on the largest cruise ships, are another significant deterrent against an attempted hijacking.  

One area of anti-terrorism security that the cruise industry is apparently actively working on is providing additional layers of protection that would prevent or deter a USS Cole-type of attack on a cruise ship by a fast moving boat laden with explosives. Although ICCL and industry officials indicated that there were indeed deterrents to such an attack already in place, they declined to elaborate arguing that the release of such information would reduce or render ineffective such measures if know to potential terrorists.  

Many other factors were cited by ICCL and cruise line officials for the lack of successful terrorist attack on cruise ships including wide-ranging internationally accepted legislation promoting and standardizing maritime security and the close and continuing collaboration between the cruise industry, the Coast Guard and State, Federal and foreign port authorities. Also cited were such measures as frequent ship security audits and assessments, detailed security planning including drills and exercises, and a contingent of designated security personnel on board every ship.  

For the time being at least, the cruise lines appear to remain relatively insulated from the terrorists’ favorite targets: airlines, trains, buses and other forms of public transportation as well as land-based resort hotels and restaurants.  

Tomorrow - Cruise 101 – Part 2- Cruise Ships and Eco-Tourism

The author is Corporate Counsel and Executive VP of Business Development for TravelTalkMEDIA, a division of CelestiaLINK, LLC.