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Dramatic video shows royal caribbean cruise ship passengers panic during freak storm.
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Dramatic video captured the moment panicked passengers ran for their lives aboard a Royal Caribbean cruise ship hit by a freak storm — which sent deck furniture flying as the vessel prepared to leave a Florida port.
The Independence of the Seas was about to embark on a voyage from Port Canaveral to the Bahamas about 4 p.m. June 16 when heavy rain and violent winds slammed the 15-deck, 1,112-foot-long vessel.
“Just a fun evening leaving Port Canaveral this past Friday. No announcement from the captain before or after, also no mention of what happened. Just pretend like it didn’t happen I guess,” TikTok user Lucassparrow1110 posted .
Sparrow also posted harrowing footage on Twitter of chairs and umbrellas flying on the ship as screaming passengers seek cover from the storm — and several people are seen sliding across a windswept walkway.
“Instead of telling people to come up to the top deck when we have a severe thunderstorm warning, maybe you should be more worried about your guests and employees and tell them to get inside,” he wrote.
At one point, a lounge chair narrowly misses a woman carrying a child.
Jenn Stancil, who captured footage of the storm moving in, told Fox 35 Orlando : “It just turned crazy. It looked like a scene from the movie ‘Twister’ is exactly what I thought, because you see these chairs flying up in the air.”
Jerry Pike, a local photographer who was sitting in his vehicle in Jetty Park during the outburst, also posted video of the storm.
“This is my view of Independence of the Seas as she started to get battered by the heavy winds whilst mid-spin attempting to turn around to leave the port,” Pike said in a tweet .
“You can see the rain line pushing towards us, and the Indy was completely gone from view due to the rain shortly after this,” he added.
A meteorologist for Fox 35 reported that winds reached from 55 to 60 mph at the height of the storm.
“The Independence was just getting battered by winds as it was trying to push off the dock,” Pike told Insider . “Then [it] was covered by the gray cloud of rain and we couldn’t see more than 20 yards out the window.”
Kyleigh Cole, an agent with Boardwalk Travel Agency, expressed concerns about how Royal Caribbean handled the incident.
“There’s always something you can do, other than just letting the guests and the travelers getting poured on, rained down on and being in the middle of a storm,” Cole told Fox 35 .
“This could have ruined somebody’s cruise experience where they’ll never take another cruise again,” the travel agent added.
In a statement sent to the news outlet, the company said the “Independence of the seas encountered a sudden gust of high winds. This lasted for a brief period and there were no serious injuries to our guests or crew…”
The ship reportedly arrived safely at Coco Cay, an island used by Royal Caribbean about 55 miles north of Nassau.
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The Royal Caribbean cruise ship Independence of the Seas was struck by a freak storm that sent passengers running for their lives. PA Images via Getty Images. “You can see the rain line pushing ...