Vacation-goers expecting to embark on a Carnival cruise to Mexico instead found themselves sitting on a shuttle en route to San Diego on Sunday.
More than 2,000 guests with tickets to board the cruise ship Carnival Imagination in Long Beach were bussed 100 miles south due to dangerous conditions in the water, a Carnival spokeswoman said.
The cruise ship company decided to switch boarding locations with high surf and powerful waves expected across southern facing waterfronts in Los Angeles County affecting the Long Beach docking area.
"The long swells that are predicted can make it unsafe to keep a ship's gangways connected and potentially stress the vessel's mooring lines," Joyce Oliva said, a Carnival spokeswoman. Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;}
Carnival Imagination's planned visit to Catalina Island tomorrow was also canceled. However, a scheduled visit to the coastal city of Ensenada, Mexico, would be extended an extra day and night, Oliva said.
The cruise ship was expected to depart from San Diego Sunday at 10 p.m. with a planned return to its homeport of Long Beach on Thursday.
