The Viking Sky luxury cruise ship lost power on Saturday and sent out a distress signal after it began drifting towards land. It was en route to Stavanger from Tromso.
Rescuers airlifted almost 500 of the 1,373 mostly elderly passengers from the ship in bad weather.
The Norwegian Red Cross reported that evacuated passengers had suffered “bruising, broken bones, and cuts”.
According to Norwegian newspaper Bergens Tidende the cruise liner was only 100m away from striking rocks on shallow ground when it finally managed to anchor and turn, avoiding running aground at the last minute.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nJ07anK15c
The Viking Sky cruise ship, which regained engine power on Sunday morning, is traveling to Molde accompanied by two supply ships and one tug assist vessel. There are 436 guests and 458 crew still remaining on the ship.
The passengers are mostly a mix of American, British, Canadian, New Zealand and Australian citizens.
Viking Ocean Cruises chairman Torstein Hagen told Norwegian newspaper VG that the events surrounding the Viking Sky were “some of the worst I have been involved in, but now it looks like it’s going well in the end and that we’ve been lucky.”
