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Dark Tourism & What Happens to the Dead on a Cruise Ship? · Curious Cat - where science & supernatural collide

0:32
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for listening to Curious Cat.
0:35
SPEAKER_00: As the days get shorter, the evenings colder, many begin to plan their mid-winter escapes.
0:41
SPEAKER_00: They reserve a chase lounge in a tropical locale, a spot to soak up sunshine and relax before spring actually warms the air.
0:51
SPEAKER_00: Others search for something besides a tan or surf lesson when they travel, though.
0:57
SPEAKER_00: Maybe seeking out sites where tragedies have occurred to better understand some of what National Geographic calls, quote, humanity's darkest chapters, end quote.
1:07
SPEAKER_00: It's called dark tourism.
1:09
SPEAKER_00: And if the pre-Halloween energies have you seeking out the strange and curious and tragic in macabre, listen close.
1:17
SPEAKER_00: Your next vacay destination awaits.
1:20
SPEAKER_00: Let's get into it.
1:22
SPEAKER_00: The definition of dark tourism from National Geographic is, quote, visiting sites associated with death, tragedy, or the macabre draws millions of travelers seeking historical education, remembrance, and a deeper understanding of humanity's darkest chapters, end quote.
1:42
SPEAKER_00: The top dark tourism destinations across the globe span centuries of history and can be categorized by types.
1:49
SPEAKER_00: These include Holocaust and Genocidal Remembrance, and those can include Auschwitz Birkennow concentration camp memorial site in Poland, where around 1.1 million people were murdered during World War II, and Toole Slang Genocide Museum in Cambodia, which preserves the atrocities of the Khmer Rouge regime, which killed somewhere around 2 million people in the 1970s.
2:17
SPEAKER_00: Kigali Genocide Memorial in Rwanda is the final resting place for over a quarter of a million victims of the 1994 Rwandan genocide.
2:29
SPEAKER_00: The next category is war and modern tragedies.
2:32
SPEAKER_00: And yeah, many of these categories do overlap.
2:36
SPEAKER_00: They're just catch basins.
2:38
SPEAKER_00: These destinations include the 9-11 Memorial and Museum in New York City, Hiroshima Peace Memorial in Japan, whose epicenter is the Genbaku Dome, which was the only structure left standing near the 1945 atomic bomb blast, the War Remnants Museum in Vietnam that details the harsh realities of the Vietnam War from a local perspective.
3:05
SPEAKER_00: The next catch basin is nuclear and natural disaster sites, which draw dark tourists as well.
3:12
SPEAKER_00: Chernobyl exclusion zone and Pripyat in Ukraine draws those captivated by the ghost town created by the 1986 nuclear disaster, which froze the place in time, though now the flora is bouncing back, adding to almost a dystopian vibe.
3:32
SPEAKER_00: The Pompeii Archaeological Park in Italy brings history buffs and students alike to witness a Roman city caught off guard by the catastrophic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD.
3:46
SPEAKER_00: The incarcerated in Macab is another catch basin for dark destinations.
3:51
SPEAKER_00: Sedlek Ostuary in Chechnya is often called the Bone Church.
3:56
SPEAKER_00: The Catholic chapel is adorned with the bones of somewhere between 40 to 70,000 people with a massive chandelier made entirely of human bones.
4:07
SPEAKER_00: This calls to mind serial killer Ed Gain.
4:10
SPEAKER_00: The catacombs of Paris in France is known far and wide for being an underground maze that holds over 6 million people who were relocated to these former stone quarries in the late 18th century to alleviate overflowing city cemeteries.
4:28
SPEAKER_00: Alcatraz Island in the U.S.
4:30
SPEAKER_00: is best known for being the federal penitentiary in the middle of San Francisco Bay that once housed America's most dangerous and notorious criminals, including Al Capone.
4:42
SPEAKER_00: I had a spooky ghost encounter there too.
4:45
SPEAKER_00: Traveling Danes blog highlights 20 sites that draw dark tourists.
4:51
SPEAKER_00: I'll only be sharing the ones not yet mentioned, but find links to their article in the show notes, please.
4:58
SPEAKER_00: They define dark tourism with a bit more empathy, writing this.
5:02
SPEAKER_00: Dark tourism is also called Thano Tourism, as Thanatos translates to death in Greek, hence the name Thanos in the Avengers.
5:13
SPEAKER_00: It means tourists traveling for sites that are connected with fear, death, trauma, and war.
5:19
SPEAKER_00: Some find problematic this whole niche, but the way they see it, if we don't talk about the horrible events in history, we forget them.
5:29
SPEAKER_00: The dark tourism sites become sites of remembrance, and it goes without saying, but this author is still willing that they can only endorse visiting dark tourism posts to learn about history as to not repeat it and behave with respect, they write.
5:47
SPEAKER_00: These sites aim to encourage visitors to be messengers of peace.
5:52
SPEAKER_00: Chichenitza in Mexico is the first that they mention.
5:56
SPEAKER_00: The Mayan temple complex Chichenitza is the largest tourist attraction in Mexico and probably in the entire region.
6:04
SPEAKER_00: In the Mayan religion, human sacrifice was a big deal.
6:08
SPEAKER_00: By sacrificing, the Mayans repaid the gods for life with the ultimate sacrifice.
6:14
SPEAKER_00: The victim was beheaded or killed by bow and arrow, sometimes tortured and heart extraction was an expression of religious devotion.
6:22
SPEAKER_00: One of the new seven wonders of the world, Chichenitsa had one of the largest, most elaborate skull racks.
6:30
SPEAKER_00: Of course, Chichenitsa is also a testimony to the other parts of Mayan culture and an example of the outstanding knowledge and society they had.
6:40
SPEAKER_00: And you should dive into that as well.
6:42
SPEAKER_00: Needless to say, it's a world heritage site.
6:46
SPEAKER_00: Yes, a pattern is forming that UNESCO finds dark tourism sites extremely important to preserve and visit, they write.
6:54
SPEAKER_00: Tower of London in England is an old castle in the middle of London.
6:58
SPEAKER_00: It's most famous for its prison called the Bloody Tower.
7:02
SPEAKER_00: You might think this is at the light end of the spectrum with ghost stories, but alas, no.
7:08
SPEAKER_00: The story behind the nickname is a bloody and sad one, but also not entirely bulletproof.
7:14
SPEAKER_00: It concerns the supposed murder of the 12-year-old Edward V and his younger brother Richard in 1483 on the orders of their uncle Richard III.
7:24
SPEAKER_00: What actually happened though is a mystery.
7:27
SPEAKER_00: In Westminster Abbey, you can still see a small coffin containing the bones of two children found in the tower.
7:34
SPEAKER_00: But it could also just be some other people that died there, making it not less sad, they write.
7:41
SPEAKER_00: And that's not to mention all the royal imprisonments, the executions and murders that have taken place in the tower, like that of the real brave heart, William Wallace.
7:53
SPEAKER_00: The shoes on the Danube bank in Hungary is a memorial of 60 pairs of shoes that are left on the east bank of the Danube River.
8:04
SPEAKER_00: The memorial honors the Jews who were massacred by fascist Hungarian military during World War II.
8:11
SPEAKER_00: They were ordered to take off their shoes because those shoes were valuable.
8:15
SPEAKER_00: The prisoners were then shot on the riverbank, so they fell directly into the water.
8:21
SPEAKER_00: 3,500 people, 800 Jewish people were murdered this way.
8:27
SPEAKER_00: The Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Israel, according to Christian tradition, Jesus was crucified and then buried there.
8:35
SPEAKER_00: When Constantine became emperor of Rome in 306, he unearthed what was thought to be the tomb.
8:42
SPEAKER_00: He then built the Church of the Holy Sepulchre around the tomb.
8:46
SPEAKER_00: You stand in a long line for hours until you enter the actual tomb.
8:51
SPEAKER_00: No pictures are allowed, and only a few people are allowed in at a time.
8:57
SPEAKER_00: This writer says, I experienced it with two strangers, one clearly being very religious and moved.
9:04
SPEAKER_00: 30 seconds, and then we're sent out, making room for the next group.
9:08
SPEAKER_00: It was a weird experience.
9:10
SPEAKER_00: This is a unique experience since this particular death is the source of an entire religion.
9:16
SPEAKER_00: And most of the other visitors are extremely invested.
9:20
SPEAKER_00: Some cry.
9:21
SPEAKER_00: And actually, this writer said, I saw more crying here than in any of the actual sad dark tourism spots.
9:29
SPEAKER_00: The entire area is one dark tourism spot.
9:32
SPEAKER_00: Via Dola Rosa, meaning the road of pain.
9:36
SPEAKER_00: Israel might not be on your list, but there was no getting around some of the most famous deaths on that list, and they only visited it recently.
9:47
SPEAKER_00: Be sure to pour over her entire post with the links, as she's also got photographs in the show notes.
9:53
SPEAKER_00: So click on that and give her some love.
9:56
SPEAKER_00: So what's that saying from Benjamin Franklin?
9:59
SPEAKER_00: In this world, nothing can be said to be certain except death and taxes.
10:04
SPEAKER_00: Well, that's true, right?
10:06
SPEAKER_00: People die every day, even on vacation.
10:09
SPEAKER_00: I wanted to know more about those cruise ships, what some call cities on the sea, and asked how many people die on them each year.
10:17
SPEAKER_00: Apparently, it's about 200 people on cruise ships that die each year worldwide.
10:24
SPEAKER_00: I asked, how do they die?
10:26
SPEAKER_00: Most often, it's due to natural causes, which is expected considering the average cruiser's age is somewhere between 45 and 56 years old, and it goes up from there.
10:38
SPEAKER_00: These deaths happen because of old age, heart attacks or strokes most often.
10:43
SPEAKER_00: Some die in rare accidents like slips, falls, drowning, or going overboard.
10:50
SPEAKER_00: Then I asked, if there is a death, what happens to a dead person on a cruise ship?
10:54
SPEAKER_00: Do they have morgues?
10:56
SPEAKER_00: This is what I found out.
10:58
SPEAKER_00: When a passenger or crew member dies on board, the medical team pronounces the death, and the body is placed in a body bag and moved to the ship's onboard morgue, often referred to as a reefer, located on the lowest deck.
11:14
SPEAKER_00: They usually have mortgage facilities.
11:17
SPEAKER_00: Most major cruise ships have a refrigerated morgue capable of holding between three and ten bodies.
11:23
SPEAKER_00: Did you know that?
11:24
SPEAKER_00: They keep the bodies at the um 36 degrees Fahrenheit to prevent decomposition.
11:31
SPEAKER_00: It's a discrete operation.
11:33
SPEAKER_00: You can imagine it's probably pretty bad for tourism and the joy factor on a cruise ship to find it or talk about a dead body.
11:41
SPEAKER_00: The crew uses specific internal code names like Operation Rising Star to manage the situation discreetly without alarming the guests.
11:52
SPEAKER_00: And there's no embalming on board, big surprise.
11:55
SPEAKER_00: Ships do not perform autopsies or embalm.
11:59
SPEAKER_00: The body is simply preserved under refrigeration.
12:02
SPEAKER_00: The body is typically kept in the morgue until the ship reaches the next scheduled port or a designated major port capable of handling human remains.
12:12
SPEAKER_00: The ship's captain and chief purser file the necessary maritime paperwork, and local authorities, port agents, and the U.S.
12:20
SPEAKER_00: consulates, if it applies, take custody of those remains when docked.
12:26
SPEAKER_00: Local funeral homes coordinate with the family or travel insurance provider to arrange permits, embalming, and transportation back to the deceased person's home country, because they probably don't want to keep frickin' cruising, right?
12:40
SPEAKER_00: Here are more details from cruise critic, links in the show notes to read her entire post and give her some love.
12:47
SPEAKER_00: When a passenger or crew member dies on board, she writes, the medical team pronounces the death and the body is placed in a body bag and moved to the ship's onboard morgue, which I mentioned earlier, referred to as the reefer.
13:01
SPEAKER_00: People die every day, even on vacation, even on a cruise.
13:05
SPEAKER_00: Sadly, this happens more often than one might think, she writes.
13:08
SPEAKER_00: According to the Broward County Medical Examiner's Office, which is where any deaths on cruise ships that have a stop at Fort Lauderdale's Port Everglades must be reported.
13:20
SPEAKER_00: Some 91 people have died on cruise ships that arrived in Fort Lauderdale between 2014 and 2017.
13:28
SPEAKER_00: While no cruise line would give cruise critic an exact number of deaths per year, one cruise line insider who asked to remain anonymous said up to three people die per week on cruises worldwide, particularly on lines that typically carry older passengers.
13:46
SPEAKER_00: The vast majority of deaths on cruise ships are natural, with most the result of heart attacks.
13:52
SPEAKER_00: But even when death is not entirely unexpected, such as when someone with advanced stage cancer chooses to cruise, it's shocking to family and friends, whether they're on the cruise ship or on land.
14:04
SPEAKER_00: But what happens when a passenger passes away at sea or in a foreign port?
14:09
SPEAKER_00: What happens to their body?
14:11
SPEAKER_00: And what do that passenger's family or friends have to do?
14:15
SPEAKER_00: She takes a closer look.
14:17
SPEAKER_00: It's impossible for a person to be prepared for a loved one's death, but the cruise lines are and they're quick to step in to help.
14:53
SPEAKER_00: Care team members are trained to deal with grieving people, but they're not grief counselors, the carnival spokesperson noted.
15:01
SPEAKER_00: They are trained to help deal with the details of repatriating a body and then also contacting a funeral home.
15:08
SPEAKER_00: In addition to helping friends and families work with local authorities, make travel arrangements, and deal with insurance.
15:16
SPEAKER_00: Care team members will provide free internet and phone use on board.
15:20
SPEAKER_00: They'll drive the deceased person's travel companions to a hotel if they choose to disembark the ship and even stay with them until they can return home.
15:29
SPEAKER_00: They also do post-cruise follow-ups.
15:33
SPEAKER_00: The biggest concern many loved ones have over this is how to bring the body home from the ship for burial.
15:40
SPEAKER_00: Whether the body must be immediately repatriated from a foreign port or can stay on board depends on a number of factors, including where the ship is at the time, which ports it's visiting, and what's the flag state of the ship, which means where the ship is registered.
15:59
SPEAKER_00: According to the Cruise Lines International Association, the latter two factors can have requirements that necessitate the offloading of anyone who's died or preclude the line from being able to offload a body.
16:14
SPEAKER_00: Additionally, the U.S.
16:16
SPEAKER_00: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention requires that any ship that calls or home ports at a U.S.
16:22
SPEAKER_00: port must immediately report any deaths on board.
16:27
SPEAKER_00: Bodies can be stored in the shipboard morgues that we mentioned, though not for much longer than a week.
16:32
SPEAKER_00: Each ocean-going cruise ship is required to carry body bags and maintain a morgue, separate from food storage areas, thank God.
16:41
SPEAKER_00: Most morgues are small, with room for three to six bodies.
16:46
SPEAKER_00: On standard Caribbean sailings, remains are often kept in the cruise ship morgue until the vessel returns to the United States, where a death certificate can be issued by local authorities.
16:58
SPEAKER_00: However, as stated above, post authorities in any of the ports visited by the crews have the right to require an examination of anyone who's died, as well as the offloading of the body.
17:10
SPEAKER_00: When someone dies on a South Pacific sailing, that body will most likely remain in the ship's morgue until the ship returns to a major port, as few, if any, of the islands on that itinerary are equipped to handle repatriation.
17:27
SPEAKER_00: Likewise, authorities in many small African and Asian ports with third world infrastructures will often refuse to allow human remains to come off of the ship.
17:38
SPEAKER_00: Alternatives can be found if necessary, such as when a ship won't be visiting a large port anytime soon.
17:46
SPEAKER_00: For example, after a Paul Goguin passenger died on a small island in the South Pacific, the body was first brought back to the ship, but then transported to a local hospital and where it was stored until it could be sent to Tahiti.
18:02
SPEAKER_00: From there, the family of the deceased was able to coordinate with the cruise line's port agent to send the body back to the U.S.
18:10
SPEAKER_00: Generally speaking, she writes, the first large port city is where the body will be offloaded and taken to a medical examiner's office and repatriated, but each country has its own rules and regulations.
18:24
SPEAKER_00: That's where consular offices come in handy.
18:27
SPEAKER_00: U.S.
18:28
SPEAKER_00: consulates, for instance, will help the family of the deceased make arrangements with local authorities.
18:35
SPEAKER_00: They'll even serve as a provisional conservator of the person's estate if no one else is able to do it.
18:42
SPEAKER_00: One final note repatriation with all its necessary paperwork and hassle is not expensive, but it does cost a pretty penny.
18:53
SPEAKER_00: Make sure your trip insurance plan includes repatriation, as that will cover the bulk of these expenses.
19:00
SPEAKER_00: Depending on the insurance company, you may also get help sorting through the paperwork and requirements.
19:06
SPEAKER_00: So while no one wants to talk about the possibility of death during a cruise, if you or someone you're sailing with is ill or in the later years of life, purchase a travel insurance policy.
19:19
SPEAKER_00: It's highly recommended.
19:21
SPEAKER_00: I wanted to know more just because we're in the thick of it right now, aren't we?
19:27
SPEAKER_00: What cruise lines report the most deaths?
19:31
SPEAKER_00: And International Journal of Travel Medicine and Global Health said this.
19:36
SPEAKER_00: Carnival cruise line has 29% of reported passenger deaths.
19:41
SPEAKER_00: Royal Caribbean Cruises has 12%.
19:44
SPEAKER_00: Norwegian cruise lines have 10%, and Holland America line Princess Cruises has 8%.
19:51
SPEAKER_00: I just wonder if those um numbers are they correlate to actually the size of these companies.
19:58
SPEAKER_00: A final note about cruising.
20:00
SPEAKER_00: There's a taboo word.
20:01
SPEAKER_00: When you're not allowed to say on a cruise ship, it causes anxiety, awkwardness, and it leads to social shunning.
20:10
SPEAKER_00: What is it?
20:12
SPEAKER_00: Titanic.
20:13
SPEAKER_00: The name of that ill-fated ship brings instant doom.
20:19
SPEAKER_00: Well, I hope the conversation helped you and yours settle on a vacation spot.
20:24
SPEAKER_00: There's nothing wrong with picking a place just for its tropical drinks and access to the beach, by the way.
20:31
SPEAKER_00: Or a location where dressing up in mouse ears or as your favorite superhero is considered normal.
20:39
SPEAKER_00: Until next time, stay curious.
20:42
SPEAKER_00: I love you.