A Florida couple who traveled on the Grand Princess ocean liner that docked in California on Monday with 21 people who tested positive for coronavirus is suing the ship’s parent company for $1 million, saying they put lives at risk.
Ronald and Eva Weissberger of Broward County, Florida, sued Princess Cruise Lines Corp., a subsidiary of Carnival Corp., alleging that the company has caused them emotional panic and trauma as they fear they will develop the coronavirus, Bloomberg News reported.
The Weissbergers claimed the company continued their voyage even after it learned passengers who sailed on a previous voyage exhibited symptoms of the coronavirus and accused them of gross negligence.
The alarm was raised among passengers when they discovered that a previous passenger on the ship, a 71-year-old with preexisting health conditions, died from coronavirus.
They also said that the cruise liner did not have proper screening protocol to prevent sick passengers from getting on board, claiming passengers were only asked to fill out a form “confirming they were not sick” without any other questions before boarding.
With 3,500 passengers from 54 countries aboard the Grand Princess, there may be more lawsuits headed towards the cruise liner. At least one lawyer, however, says it will be difficult to win these types of cases.
“It’s almost an act of god, this virus,” said Jason Lohr, a San Francisco-based plaintiffs’ lawyer. “It’ll be difficult to articulate a duty the cruise line could’ve had given the nature of a pandemic.”
Princess said it had not seen the lawsuit and declined to comment further.