Royal Caribbean International Responds to Allegations Involving George Smith's Disappearance With Factual Chronology

MIAMI, Jan 05, 2006 /PRNewswire-FirstCall via COMTEX News Network/ -- George Smith, IV tragically disappeared from the Brilliance of the Seas sometime in the early morning hours of July 5, 2005, while the ship was sailing in the Mediterranean Sea on a 12-day cruise enroute to Turkey. The reason for his disappearance is being thoroughly investigated by the FBI but is still unknown. The FBI has requested that Royal Caribbean and others connected with the incident limit their remarks so as not to compromise that investigation, and we have resisted commenting until now. Even today, we will not comment on items which could interfere with the FBI's investigation.

All of us at Royal Caribbean extend our deepest sympathies to Jennifer Hagel Smith and the whole Smith family. They have suffered an inconsolable loss, and it is totally understandable they want answers and some measure of closure regarding Mr. Smith's disappearance. However, there has been a lot of inaccurate and unfair speculation about our company's response to the incident, and the time has come to set the record straight.

I. Royal Caribbean acted immediately upon learning Mr. Smith might have gone overboard, searched for him, and performed a thorough investigation to find out what happened.

II. The ship's crew responded properly to the one complaint of "partying" noise coming from the Smith cabin during the night in question.

III. We notified Turkish and U.S. law enforcement authorities promptly and cooperated fully with their investigation, and we continue to assist the FBI in its search for the truth. This included promptly sealing the cabin and canopy over the lifeboats, providing authorities with access to all passengers and crewmembers, and providing all other information requested or known. All evidence in the cabin and on the canopy was protected until the Turkish authorities finished their forensic investigation late that afternoon and told the ship those areas were released for cleaning.

IV. At each and every step, Mrs. Hagel Smith was treated with compassion and, while in Turkey after the incident, was provided constant assistance and support, including a personal escort from the ship throughout the ensuing investigation.

V. Upon learning of Mr. Smith's disappearance, we kept the family informed until they directed us not to contact them.

[ 01-05-2006: Message edited by: jsea ]

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Originally posted by lasuvidaboy:
This case is very odd. In interviews I have seen w/the family they think that RCI did very little and tried to cover up evidence by washing away blood stains etc...

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What could the cruise line do to really make things better - very little! If RCI did wash blood, this may have been to protect other passengers from distress.

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Originally posted by Malcolm @ cruisepage:

What could the cruise line do to really make things better - very little! If RCI did wash blood, this may have been to protect other passengers from distress.

I suspect there are many much speculation mixed in with the few facts available.

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Not exactly the typical honeymooners are they? She is drunk and falls asleep in a corridor somewhere else. Then is in the spa the next morning without even noticing her husband is missing, or blood in the cabin? She got away lightly with the authorities and could easily have been slung in a jail for a long period, then she might have had something to complain about.

The unanswered question is who were making the loud noises in the cabin when the complaint was made...

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Originally posted by PamM:
"She added they had been partying and that he had slept elsewhere on the ship on at least one other night during the cruise."

Not exactly the typical honeymooners are they? She is drunk and falls asleep in a corridor somewhere else. Then is in the spa the next morning without even noticing her husband is missing, or blood in the cabin? She got away lightly with the authorities and could easily have been slung in a jail for a long period, then she might have had something to complain about.

The unanswered question is who were making the loud noises in the cabin when the complaint was made...

Pam

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His family apparently own several liquor stores. Maybe they brought their own large supply w/them?

My feeling is that RCI decided initially to play it very quietly: they may have a feeling that this will end up in a court somewhere, sometime, for one reason or another, and the less they say for the moment, the better. But the husband's family's comments this last few weeks has forced their hand, I imagine, and RCI have produced this long and very detailed response.

It's a superb document: there's not the slightest whisper that RCI think that this anything but a accident and a tragedy, even though it reveals a lot of very, very strange behaviour.

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Originally posted by Frosty 4:
This Smith incident sounds very fishy. Not from RCL but from the wife and Smith family-now part of a group seeking answers of missing cruise people. Sleeping in passageways? Or in other parts of the ship? On a honeymoon?
The ship's officers make rounds around the ship, timetable not known but to check security. But I'm sure it's often. I'm sure they would notice someone sleeping or drunk in a passageway.Did you ever see the security systems the ship has on the bridge,quite extensive and who knows what other security is not seen.
We are not aware of the forensic testing results.
As the famous Dr. Henry Lee has stated"Someting is wrong here"!!
F4

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Originally posted by PamM:
Not exactly the typical honeymooners are they?

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Originally posted by Malcolm @ cruisepage:

Yes, not typical for RCI, more Carnival I think!

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There is something odd about this couple as I read another online report today which commented that the 2 had been escorted out the disco on 2 occasions by security, for arguing loudly and she had kicked him where it hurts. Who knows what is the truth in this case. Her lawyer is now trying to make out she *may* have been drugged, which was why she was asleep in the corridor.. but does say he has no evidence.. I think they are just very hard drinkers and went way way OTT on this whole trip!

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Originally posted by PamM:
Aren't they on OV & Thomson now Ernst ?

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Originally posted by PamM:
She is drunk and falls asleep in a corridor somewhere else. Then is in the spa the next morning without even noticing her husband is missing, or blood in the cabin?

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Originally posted by Frosty 4:
As the famous Dr. Henry Lee has stated"Someting is wrong here"!!

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There was an article this week outlining some of the ridiculous cases that people tried to make last year to extract money from our local authorities.. read here.

Whatever happened this lady cannot remember a thing as she was so drunk; he was drunk, and they had both been drunk for most of the cruise it appears. I don't think any of the staff would have been able to stop serving them, the response would not have been polite, and could have ended in violence.

I predicted in another posting that Greta Van Sustern, and Fox News would now make a case over the missing Irish Girl, similar to her fatuous efforts to stretch the Aruba disappearance of a young teenager last sppring into weeks and months of talk and interviews until it vanished into news never-neverland.

I assumed the missing Irish Girl would provide similar news fodder, good for weeks of coverage like the Aruba case.

No, worse yet!! Our Greta has now moved in on the Royal Carribean murder, but a few minutes ago, was building a case against the cruise line by her line of questioning of "experts."

It's going to be a long, slow, winter folks.

In some ways you just can't win if you are a cruise line. You are on a ship, at sea, lots of that water stuff, which most of the time you can't access but from a great height and at night. Some idiot will propose putting safety nets all around the ship.

Both the husband and wife sound like drunk morons above and beyond the incident.

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Originally posted by PamM:
Sadly it seems no-one wishes to take responsibilty for their own actions any more; anythings that goes wrong or 'happens' has got to be someone else's fault.

Pam

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PR practitioners disagree on Royal Caribbean media strategy
By Kristin O'Meara Hillmann
January 17, 2006)

NEW YORK -- As Royal Caribbean last week leaped head-first into an unusual all-out public relations war with the family of a passenger who went missing under mysterious circumstances, crisis management and PR experts disagreed strongly about the wisdom of the cruise line’s strategy.

The convoluted tale of George Smith IV’s disappearance from a cruise in the Mediterranean has attracted intense -- and increasingly negative -- media scrutiny in the last three weeks.

Royal Caribbean has responded in kind with an uncharacteristically aggressive approach, publicly disputing claims made by Smith’s wife, family and lawyers, and even admonishing reporters covering the story.

Crisis-management experts, both professionals and academics, offered widely divergent points of view about the line’s new tactics, while executives of other cruise lines were characteristically less than forthcoming on the subject of missing passengers.

As negative publicity about the case grew -- often in the form of clearly biased reporting and commentary on the part of TV news media -- Royal Caribbean countered by offering the ship’s captain; the line’s chairman and CEO, Richard Fain; and other company officials for TV interviews. In addition, the company mounted increasingly contentious press conferences in recent days to counter the family’s criticisms of Royal Caribbean’s handling of the incident.

Several travel industry PR practitioners told Travel Weekly they were surprised by Royal Caribbean’s aggressive new approach. Yet some crisis-management experts familiar with the case said that the cruise line’s tactics were well-advised and would likely mitigate damage to its credibility with investors and consumers.

Two critics of the campaign -- both PR executives speaking on condition that they not be identified -- said some of the more questionable tactics included a barrage of official statements disputing accounts offered by Smith’s parents and his wife, Jennifer Hagel Smith, the distribution of an extensive chronology of the events surrounding Smith’s disappearance and a teleconference called to counter the “top 10 myths” of the case.

One PR executive said the chronology document was “incredible” and added, “In 20 years of PR, I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Another PR executive described the chronology as “binging and purging,” and both executives speculated that the cruise line’s sudden high-profile tactics might do more harm than good.

But two crisis-management experts said Royal Caribbean’s recent efforts will help control the story’s direction and increase the cruise line’s credibility.

Jonathan Bernstein, a crisis-management expert with 23 years in the field, said the cruise line appears to have “done everything right from what I’ve seen so far. They’re being as transparent as they can be.”

The sudden flurry of press conferences and TV appearances by corporate executives is unusual for the cruise industry Bernstein said.

Bernstein, who heads his own crisis-management firm, said Royal Caribbean is hamstrung by its obligation not to reveal facts that pertain to an ongoing investigation by the FBI.

“It’s a real thing, not an excuse,” Bernstein said. “They are not the ones officially responsible for releasing details. Those are supposed to come from the investigating authority.” In fact, he speculated, “the cruise line would probably like to say more than they can.”

“It’s very natural for victims to feel extreme anger and to strike out at anybody who might be responsible,” Bernstein said, and their message is one that’s difficult to counter, even with facts.

Royal Caribbean’s decision to put top executives on camera demonstrates to shareholders and the public that “they are not hiding behind a corporate veil” and in fact are “cooperative and responsive,” he said.

James Lukaszewski, who heads The Lukaszewski Group in White Plains, N.Y., acknowledged that the adversarial nature of the media row is “extra difficult to counter,” given the press’ natural affinity for the emotionally charged story of the victim and the victim’s family.

“Great TV” is made with emotion, he said, and “ ‘blow-viators’ work so hard [to do this] on the cable channels, where audiences are finite” and gravitate toward emotionally charged stories.

“The pain is real,” he said of the Smith family. “These people are victims. But to say they are [the line’s] adversaries is correct.”

He said Royal Caribbean’s effort to publicize their set of facts on their Web site, in press conferences and by directly countering claims made by the Smith family and Jennifer Hagel Smith has been effective because the cruise line has, to some extent, circumvented the media.

By using their Web site as a sort of clearinghouse for updated information, he said, Royal Caribbean officials “begin to establish a base of information about the story from their perspective and to manage the record of the story over time.”

Mea culpa -- with care

The cruise line has expressed its sorrow for Smith’s family and wife both in its written communication and in media interviews.

“One of the greatest challenges is to be empathetic with someone who has set out to do you in,” Lukaszewski said, adding that Royal Caribbean would do well to continue to “move toward a stance of an apology.”

“My advice is always to say as much as you can as soon as you can to shorten the life of the adventure in general, because it becomes less interesting,” Lukaszewski said.

However, Don Stacks, director of the Advertising/Public Relations program at the University of Miami School of Communications, said that the company’s effort to get the facts out now, while on the right track, came “way too late.”

The negative implications of the story, he said, extend well beyond Royal Caribbean’s immediate sphere. “It will be a black eye for the cruise industry if this sort of thing continues to bubble and perk. They’ve got one huge negative out there right now.”

Stacks agreed that the ongoing FBI investigation did limit Royal Caribbean’s ability to fully disclose events of the Smith case but asserted: “It’s going to be hard to mitigate public opinion because it’s hard to take back what’s out there.”

In general, he said, the cruise lines have a track record of learning hard lessons from PR missteps in high-profile cases.

“With the Norwalk virus, the first time, ... they claimed they didn’t have it. But the [second] time, they were open and honest; they said they were working on it, and the story went away,” he said.

“You need to get the truth out ... it goes to the definition of PR,” he said.

Bernstein also characterized the cruise industry’s PR track record as shaky.

“Cruise lines have been very bad at crisis management,” he said. “All the sickness epidemics have been handled in a very bad way. They have made claims that were blatantly untrue, which is always a risky thing to do. They have not shown a lot of empathy for victims.”

Stacks said that in the future, Royal Caribbean and cruise lines in general would do well to emulate the approach taken by airlines in the event of a crash or other catastrophic events by using a crisis-management plan that clearly delineates their actions, identifies information that can and cannot be released for ethical or legal reasons and prescribes next steps.

Lukaszewski, however, said when it comes to getting the message out, “There is no ‘too late.’” And the lack of any identifiable impact on Royal Caribbean’s business, he added, bears that out.

Lukaszewski predicted that the Smith case would likely have “very little impact” on Royal Caribbean’s business in the immediate future. “It’s sad to say, but it would fit the pattern; we’re all engaged in our own pursuits, and people are aware of it, but it’s not influencing their decision-making.”

In some cases, even negative publicity can give companies a “bizarre” bump in business, he said.

The bottom line

For now, Royal Caribbean’s business appears to be unaffected by the media firestorm. Its stock price remained stable, and the cruise line had seen no downturn in bookings, according to Lynn Martenstein, the line’s vice president of corporate communications.

A major cruise retailer, who requested anonymity, said her agency had seen “nothing -- absolutely no indication” of a falloff in business.

And, despite the intense media scrutiny, Terry Dale, president and CEO of the Cruise Lines International Association, the story was but one of several topics discussed at a recent cruise industry gathering.

“There’s a cruise industry coalition of ICCL, CLIA and directors of public relations for member lines who meet to discuss issues, as an industry,” he said. “We did talk about it. There were other topics discussed, too -- avian flu, for instance.”

Travel Weekly

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The company continues to be concerned that the release of so much information about this case has the effect of making the FBI's investigation more difficult, and that view has been repeatedly expressed by not only our company and others but also the FBI as recently as today.

Nevertheless, the company has decided to permit attorneys and investigators for the Smith family and Jennifer Hagel Smith to visit the ship on Monday, January 23, with the hope that they will honor the concerns about maintaining the confidentiality and the integrity of the FBI's investigation.