A 28-year-old man spent about 15 hours in the Gulf of Mexico after he fell off the Carnival Valor cruise ship before he was rescued. A passing container ship spotted him in the water, waving a sock over his head, and a Coast Guard helicopter lifted him to safety. The Coast Guard rescue swimmer said that the man, James Grimes, was at the end of his rope and probably had just minutes left to live.
Grimes was on board the Carnival Valor with his parents and his sister for a Thanksgiving holiday cruise from New Orleans to Cozumel, Mexico. The Carnival Valor is 952 feet long and holds 2,974 passengers.
On Thanksgiving eve, after the ship left New Orleans, Grimes and his sister went to the bar to celebrate. About 11 p.m. he told her he had to use the bathroom. He never came back.
His sister waited until about noon the next day, Thanksgiving, to notify the ship’s authorities that Grimes was missing. Security personnel walked around the ship, showing his picture on their cell phones to other passengers. They drained one of the ship’s swimming pools.
About 2:30 p.m., when Grimes was still missing, the ship notified the Coast Guard, and then turned around to retrace its route on a search-and-rescue mission.
The Coast Guard alerted all mariners in the Gulf to be on the lookout for a man overboard, and it launched a small boat from Venice, Florida, a helicopter from New Orleans, and fixed-wing planes from Clearwater, Florida, and Mobile, Alabama.
About 8 p.m., the crew of the bulk carrier CRINIS saw something in the water about 20 miles south of Southwest Pass, Louisiana; it was a man. They called the Coast Guard.
A Coast Guard Jayhawk crew from New Orleans flew to the spot and lifted the man up out of the water. They said he was hypothermic and dehydrated but he could talk and tell them he was the person they were looking for. They flew him back to New Orleans, where he was listed in stable condition. Grimes did not say how he fell overboard.
The Coast Guard estimated that Grimes had spent at least 15 hours, and probably more, before he was rescued. The water temperature was about 70 degrees at the time.
Lt. Seth Gross, a search-and-rescue coordinator for the Coast Guard, told CNN, “I think it kind of blows the norm, the normalcy, out of the water here, and really shows the will to live is something that you need to account for in every search-and-rescue case.”
Once Grimes was found, the Carnival Valor resumed its voyage to Cozumel.
Read more at https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/man-rescued-carnival-cruise-gulf-of-mexico/index.html and see the video below:
