Luxury Cruise Ship Carrying 206 Passengers Stranded In Remote Part Of Greenland

A luxury cruise ship with more than 200 passengers and crew on board is stuck in a remote part of Greenland after it ran aground, the Independent  reported. The operator of the cruise ship said all its passengers are "safe and well"  but a rescue ship will not be able to arrive until Friday. The three-week cruise left on September 1 and was scheduled to return to port on September. 22. The cruise ship charged as much as $33,000 from the passengers for the trip, according to the New York Post.

As per Forbes, the expedition cruise ship called the Ocean Explorer became stuck Monday around noon, more than 850 miles from Nuuk, the capital of Greenland.

From Artic Commands Facebook page;
“Arctic Command has been in contact with the cruise ship Ocean Explorer, which has stated that they are still grounded in the National Park.

This means that the tide, which came during the day local time, did not provide the desired help to… pic.twitter.com/cmxEyWCzBH

— Orla Joelsen (@OJoelsen) September 12, 2023

''On Monday afternoon West Greenlandic time, the Arctic Command received a message that the cruise ship Ocean Explorer was grounded in the Alpefjord in Northeast Greenland, and that the ship is not immediately able to be freed by its own help,'' Denmark's Joint Arctic Command (JAC) said in a statement.

The Joint Arctic Command also revealed that the ship had so far been unable to free itself despite Tuesday's tides. 

Aurora Expeditions, the ship's operator, said there was no immediate danger to anyone on board or to the surrounding environment, and there were enough supplies aboard the ship. 

''The nearest help is far away, our units are far away, and the weather can be very unfavorable. However, in this specific situation, we do not see any immediate danger to human life or the environment. Of course, we are following the situation closely and take this incident very seriously'', Brian Jensen of the Danish military's Joint Arctic Command added. 

Satellite view of the Ocean Explorer – the cruise ship aground in the Alpefjord (East Greenland) with 206 people on board – as seen by @CopernicusEU Sentinel-2 yesterday. Not a very friendly place to be stuck at, but the good news is that the fjord is largely free of icebergs. pic.twitter.com/HV7KwiPvzS

— Bert Wouters (@bert_polar) September 12, 2023

However, more concerning is the fact that several cases of COVID have been reported on board among the mostly elderly passengers, most of whom are Australian, according to The Sydney Morning Herald.

''Everyone's in good spirits. It's a little bit frustrating, but we are in a beautiful part of the world. We're sitting right near the glacier when we open our window,'' Steven Fraser, a retired Aussie travelling with his wife said. 

''We do have a couple of cases of Covid, but there's a doctor on board ... a lot of people on board are quite elderly,'' Mr Fraser added. 

An inspection vessel, the Knud Rasmussen, is en route toward the grounded cruise ship and is expected to arrive on Friday morning, authorities said. The Joint Arctic Command said it has asked a nearby cruise ship to remain in the area to provide assistance in case the situation changes, reported Insider. 

Built in 2021, the Ocean Explorer is an Infinity-class vessel that can accommodate 134 passengers.  According to Aurora Expeditions' website, the ship was "purpose-built for expedition travel to the world's most wild and remote destinations." 

Its next voyage, a 12-day trip set to depart from Argentina on October 30 and travel throughout Antarctica, costs $13,395 per passenger, as per the Post.