Is Carnival Cruise lines just having a bad couple of years, or do they just suck?

[randomness]

The news about the Carnival Triumph and its recent troubles got me to looking into the line's recent record:

• On November 8, 2010, a fire broke out in the generator room of the Carnival Splendor and the ship lost most power.


• On January 13, 2012, the Costa Concordia, operated by a Carnival subsidiary, ran aground off Isola del Giglio, Tuscany. The ship capsized and partially sank, killing 32 people.


• In March 2012, the Costa Allegra, owned by Carnival Cruise Lines' Costa Cruises subsidiary, suffered an engine room fire and went adrift in the Indian Ocean.


• In February 2013, the Carnival Triumph, with 3,143 passengers aboard, suffered an engine room fire, leaving the ship adrift for days in the Gulf of Mexico.

Is this number of incidents normal for cruise lines? Is Carnival Cruise lines known to be more accident prone than other lines? They do have a large fleet, so I suppose it could just be random chance, but it doesn't seem like a good record.

I don't know the first thing about cruise lines and their reputations, so I'm asking.

Comments

[contrariety.livejournal.com]

Given the economy and the fact that Carnival caters to one of the lower socioeconomic tiers of cruise customers, who are probably harder hit by the recession, it wouldn't surprise me if Carnival's revenues have been pretty bad for a while. So it also wouldn't surprise me if they've been cutting a lot of corners with crew and maintenance. That's just a guess, though.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I also found the quote, "If you sail Carnival Cruise Line....You might be a redneck!"

From what I've been reading, margins are pretty tight for the industry as a whole, not just Carnival. On the other hand, because they do cater to poorer cruise customers, Carnival may have even less room for error than some other lines.