Police in the Australian state of New South Wales removed electronic logs from the Carnival Corp-owned cruiseship Ruby Princess as part of their criminal investigation into the coronavirus-linked deaths of 15 out of 2,700 passengers who disembarked from the ship in Sydney on 19 March.
At least 15 fatalities and more than 600 cases have been linked to the 113,600-gt, 2008-built cruiseship, which is now considered as being the epicentre of Australia’s coronavirus outbreak.
Investigators boarded the ship at Port Kembla, and industrial port south of Sydney.
Police officials described the vessel’s master as being extremely helpful.
The investigation was launched after NSW Police decided that the multiple passenger deaths linked to the ship could be viewed as "suspicious".
They are seeking to learn whether any Australian biosecurity laws were broken when the decision to allow the ship to disembark its passengers in Sydney was made.
New South Wales police commissioner Mick Fuller said when the investigation was launched vessels were only allowed to dock and disembark passengers if the master could assure the local authorities that their ship was free from contagious disease.
Criminal probe
"The only way I can get to the bottom of whether our national biosecurity laws and our state laws were broken is through a criminal investigation," he told reporters.
The Ruby Princess is operated by Carnival’s Princess Cruises brand. It is the third Princess vessel to suffer a major Covid-19 outbreak on board, beginning with the 115,900-gt Diamond Princess (built 2004) in Japan during early February, followed by the 107,500-gt Grand Princess (built 1998) off the coast of California in early March.
Princess is facing a slew of lawsuits filed in US courts by passengers on the ships who allege the company acted in a negligent manner by failing to inform them beforehand that there had been cases of coronavirus on board during the preceding cruises.
On Thursday Australia had reported 6,073 coronavirus cases, while the death toll stood at 51.
