Last Friday, at approximately 9 a.m., Carnival Cruise Lines’ 2,052-passenger cruise ship, Carnival Imagination, rescued three boaters whose vessel capsized approximately 14 miles north of the sea buoy off the coast of Miami.

            Carnival Imagination was en route to its homeport of Miami when officers on the ship’s bridge saw the capsized vessel.  Captain Candeloro Donato immediately initiated rescue operations, positioning the vessel toward the capsized boat and lowering one of the Carnival Imagination’s rescue boats.  The U.S. Coast Guard was notified, as well.

            The three boaters were safely brought onto the Carnival Imagination’s rescue boat as it stood by under instructions from the U.S. Coast Guard, which dispatched a 33-foot Special Purpose Craft to take them to Miami.

            The 70,000-ton Carnival Imagination operates year-round three- and four-day cruises from Miami.