The latest Carnival cruise ship, Carnival Vista, failed the USPH inspection. The ship received 79 points after inspectors found numerous violations, most of them related to the Food and Beverage department. The inspection was held in December, however, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released the report of violations today.
The report states that an organized effort was made to physically move several containers and trolleys of food equipment, utensils, raw produce, and decorations to a crew cabin hallway and a crew cabin in order hide it from the VSP inspectors. Apparently, Deck 9 Crew Cabin Hallway was looking like a big hiding storage that day.
On Deck 9 crew area inspectors found six gray containers of soiled plastic cups which, a stack of approximately 100 plates labeled 'chipped plates' stored directly on the deck, one container of bread, four lexan containers of plastic and metal serving utensils, 23 packages of butter... and the list goes on.
Inside a crew cabin on Deck 9, three lexan bins were found with Bread crisps, produce, raw salmon, spices, sauces, butter, and cherry tomatoes. On top of that a cook's uniform was hanging on a hook directly above these items. A rolling cart in the same crew cabin contained two containers of crisps, spices, shallots, beans, eggplant, garlic, raw lamb cutlet, raw produce and a pan of lasagna. At the time of the finding, VSP inspectors observed crew members dispose of all the food items stored in the hallway and in the crew cabin.
It is obvious that this organized hiding was made by the onboard management and the crew was just the executors of the orders given by their supervisors, without thinking of the dangers that the guests and crew face after consuming potentially hazardous food served in these dishes.
Miami Herald released a statement by Carnival spokeswoman Jennifer De La Cruz that reads “We take these inspections very seriously and share lessons learned and best practices with every ship in our fleet.”
This is not the first time cruise lines have used this tactic to hide food and food preparation equipment in the hallways. Below is a rare video footage (probably the only public video), released back in 2008 by the popular crew forum “Inozemstvo Posao na Brod”. In the video, you can see the same hiding tactic used to store food and material when USPH inspectors are onboard. The video description does not mention the name of the ship it was recorded.
Another interesting point which is mentioned in the video description is the safety violations. With this actions, emergency escape routes are obstructed. In an event of a real emergency, this routes can become death traps. “Why safety officers tolerate obstructed emergency escape routes? They get bonus for a good USPH score. That's why Norovirus never goes away,” says the author of the video.
