A medical emergency has delayed the return of a Royal Caribbean ship to its home port.
Royal Caribbean’s Vision of the Seas will be delayed returning to Baltimore, Maryland, due to a medical evacuation. Because of the emergency, Vision of the Seas unexpectedly diverted in San Juan, Puerto Rico to evacuate the passenger before continuing its sailing.
The docking in San Juan has caused Vision of the Seas to be delayed on its current voyage, which will push back the ship’s return by one day to Baltimore. This diversion will also cause the ship's following 12-night itinerary on January 16, 2024 to depart one day later.
According to guests onboard the current sailing, Vision of the Seas will now return to Baltimore on Friday, January 17, 2025 at 7:00 am. Guests will be able to disembark the vessel at this time.
The Vision class ship was sailing on a 12-night round-trip itinerary from Baltimore, Maryland to the Caribbean. Ports of call included St. Croix, St. John’s, St. Maarten, Martinique and St. Kitts & Nevis.
Vision of the Seas departed St. Kitts on January 12, 2024 to begin sailing back to Baltimore, Maryland. The ship was scheduled to have three sea days before returning to Baltimore on Thursday, January 16, 2025. Guests currently aboard Vision of the Seas reported the captain made an announcement in the late afternoon about diverting towards Puerto Rico for an emergency airlift.
(Current location at time of publication for Vision of the Seas. Source: CruiseMapper)
“We are turning around to go to San Juan, Puerto Rico. It's 150 nautical miles from where we are. They're trying to get the coast guard involved and will notify us more once we have more information,” commented one passenger onboard on the Vision of the Seas Facebook page.
Those onboard reported the captain later announced in the evening that the Coast Guard deemed an airlift was not possible. “They just announced that [the] Coast Guard cannot do an airlift, so we have to go all the way to San Juan to get this person off. We should be there tomorrow morning,” shared one guest on Facebook.
Instead of the airlift, Vision of the Seas would sail to San Juan, Puerto Rico to dock and evacuate the passenger. After arriving in San Juan, guests reported the passenger was successfully transferred to the hospital and the ship resumed the sailing almost immediately.
(Photos shared from passenger on Facebook)
“We docked in San Juan at 5:00 am, the passenger and her family were taken off, we are all praying for her!” commented one guest on Facebook.
Royal Caribbean sent communication to guests on the impacted January 16, 2025 sailing about the delay. The cruise line said, “Due to our previous sailing’s delay in arriving at the Port of Baltimore, our sailing will now take place on Friday, January 17th.”
Vision of the Seas was originally scheduled to sail on an 8-night itinerary from Baltimore on January 16, 2025. The original itinerary would sail to Charleston (South Carolina), Port Canaveral (Florida), Grand Bahama Island (Bahamas) and Nassau (Bahamas) with three sea days. To make up for the delay, Vision of the Seas will skip its first port of call in Charleston, South Carolina with an additional sea day.
One passenger shared in a post on Reddit, “We received an email stating we are now boarding Friday morning instead of Thursday and an updated itinerary. No more Charleston (sad). Getting pro-rated for the day we will miss and any packages that were purchased in the form of onboard credit for that day.”
In addition to the medical evacuation, Vision of the Seas might need to navigate choppy waters with an Atlantic storm passing through the area. One guest onboard commented, "Captain was trying to go around a storm, but now that we are changing course for the medical evacuation, we may end up having to sail into the weather system.”
Royal Caribbean states that all guests will receive refunds for shore excursions booked in Charleston, South Carolina to the original form of payment. Those with booked flights through Royal Caribbean will automatically be rescheduled. Those with independent airfare will receive $400 USD for international travel and $200 for domestic travel, on a per person basis.
