A New Jersey couple has filed a lawsuit against Viking Cruises after its disastrous trip in March.
Axel and Lauren Freudmann alleged that the cruise line “negligently sailed through notoriously perilous waters into the path of a bomb cyclone,” despite severe weather warnings.”
They filed the suit Wednesday in the Los Angeles County Superior Court individually and on behalf of other passengers.
The 1,373 passengers on the cruise ship were left stranded in rough seas on March 23 after the ship suffered an engine failure. More than 470 passengers were forced to evacuate and Norwegian officials launched an investigation into the matter.
Twenty people suffered minor injuries, according to the Swiss cruise company.
The lawsuit claims that there had been multiple weather warnings prior to setting sail, including one for “an intense cyclone” and “extremely severe wind gusts” that could exceed 75 mph. Despite all of that, The Viking Sky still embarked on its journey from Norway on March 21.
Passengers were not informed of the severity of the weather they would encounter on the ship, which the suit described as “a historic winter weather event.”
“You really have the worst-case scenario, which is a vessel being without power, in the middle of a storm, subject to the mercy of 30-, 40-, 50-foot waves, hurricane-force winds,” Michael Winkleman, one of the attorneys representing the passengers in the case, said in an interview with “Good Morning America.”
The passengers are seeking $10 million in damages, according to Winkleman.
