As the Royal Caribbean Oasis of the Seas comes into port today in Miami, will we get more clarity of the news/rumors that a 36 year old passenger died of an overdose early Wednesday morning?
First Reports
On Thursday, we received an email from a reader pointing the the Twitter/X account of James (Jim) Walker @CruiseLaw. One of his most recent posts claims that there was a death on board the Atlantis Events charter of the Oasis of the Seas.
The critique of – Atlantis Events’ cruises on Royal Caribbean ships have been plagued by arrests, drug use, passengers going overboard, alpha-alpha-alpha codes & drug-related shipboard deaths over the years. – seems a little pointed, but again somewhat true and resonates with the gay cruises, but then again, “those kind of cruises” are always under a spotlight and judged heavily even before the ship leaves the port. And arrests and deaths on cruise ships happen often, no matter gay, straight, chartered by different groups, that’s why they all have a jail area, but the deaths on most cruises are usually older individuals or just accidents and not the finger-pointing targets of drug overdoses although those do happen, too on non-gay cruises.
The Company Says…
We did reach out to Royal Caribbean and supplied them with links to the social media mentions of this alleged tragedy. A representative of the company stated:
On background, I can confirm that we had a death onboard and that it was unexpected and not suspicious.
Reddit and the Twitter/X thread mentioned above are elaborating, unofficially.
Luis Escorcia @LuisEscorcia18 shared this visual on CruiseLaw’s tweet, something he also posted on /death_on_atlantis_cruise/
Also on Reddit, we can see Impossiblelaw292 is stating that she is the brother of the man who allegedly died onboard. More can be found on the subchat linked here /death_on_the_cruise/.
There, you’ll find the many sides of the debate and situation represented;
- how can they let drugs on the cruise
- why are they buying on board
- did the seller know the drugs were laced with something
- it’s all a bath house with great food
- it’s like Grindr with a buffet
Not the Alpha You’re Looking For
No matter how you feel about these big gay cruises, it appears that the cruise line has responded with swift action. Reports of hearing alpha-alpha-alpha over the ship’s intercom were mentioned by many on social media.
So it’s not a good thing to hear, but when you hear it, you know there will be assistance on the way. One Alantis cruiser mentioned hearing it often. Someone else posted they hear 4, this cruiser uses the word tons.
With nothing official released yet, we will have to wait and see if the allegations are true. But unfortunately, we will not be surprised if this horrible occurrence did happen. We all have our different types of fun, we all take risks, but sometimes those risks are increased when someone unknown to us has changed some of the variables.
Is there a Sister?
To continue with the drama and the unknown, the question remains, was there even a sister? One Twitter/X follower sends this:
So there is someone each year poking around to see if someone died? And they’re pretending to be a relative of a possible deceased person? So says Benny_Banks. The sister’s handle is Impossiblelaw292 and the person that first started talking about this on socials was a lawyer. Searching TikTok for Atlantis death, we get another lawyer chiming in.
@cruiseshiplawyer
Could us knowing about all of this be because of lawyers digging into Reddit to see what they could find? Did someone create a fake Reddit account to get this all going? Was law in the Reddit handle a give away? Just some thoughts.
No matter what the case, it is possible that some people were not cautious, the drug dealer, the buyer/user. Blaming the cruise line is not the thing to do unless Atlantis cruisers and any cruiser on any ship don’t mind cavity searches and complete baggage checks as some desire to bring drugs on board.
Be safe, be well.
Thank you for publishing this article. My partner keeps saying he wants to do one of these cruises and I have to keep telling him that they are too dangerous. I am going to forward this him in hopes that he will stop asking about it. In some instances when you look at the toxicology reports it seems apparent that these guys didn’t take this mix of drugs themselves. Joel Taylor died with Ambien, MDMA, GHB, and alcohol in his system, that would only be a cocktail for someone who wanted to kill themselves if he took all of those voluntarily. His “friends” then stashed away in his state room while he was overdosing so that he didn’t interrupt the party while he was dying. Most likely at least some of those drugs were slipped into his drink. Thank you, but we will be taking a Disney Cruise instead.
We were on an Atlantis cruise (Royal Caribbean) in October 2023 out of LA. At the end, there were two young men who died of overdoses, found dead in their cabin.
It’s not just gay people who die of drug overdoses. The sad truth is that doing dangerous drugs can have fatal consequences.
But how do we educate people to stop this behavior? It is very difficult and sad. Maybe if we publicize this enough, some people will make choices to avoid this behavior. Maybe…….
Why are you assuming that they took the drugs? Whenever a woman dies under these circumstances we always assume her drink was dosed. I extend this same benefit to these young men. Everyone always assumes these young men who overdose take the drugs themselves and the gay drug crowd uses that so that there is never any investigation. I myself do not do drugs and have been dosed repeatedly, especially in my youth, in supposed gay “safe spaces”. If this had happened to me I would hate to have someone assume I took the drugs myself.
Actually two sisters. Please correct your article and make an editorial note along with a retraction.
The speculation from a single tweet without any verification is absurd.
Speculation from a single tweet? What do you mean by that? We contacted the cruise line because of a social media post and the cruise line’s response is in the post.
Please provide links to where two different sisters were communicating. Did they use the same social media handles?
Those two sisters are my cousins and our family is grieving. We are simply looking for answers and people minimizing the situation is hurtful.
Please provide links to where two different sisters were communicating. Did they use the same social media handles?
My best friend went on one these cruises. He described it as a floating bathhouse. A great horny time. Yup he slept with the staff, other passengers and boys waiting in ports. Dorothy it’s not Kansas. It’s a boat full of horny men in speedos.
This is certainly a tragedy if true but I am a a bit lost as to the narrative we are trying to perpetuate with this article. Proportionally, this would not represent a significant statistical variant compared to a normal cruise. And certainly not anything beyond what you might see on an EDM cruise which focuses on music and late night dancing. There was a death 2 years ago on the Atlantis cruise as well which was ultimately found to be from natural causes based on autopsy. Heck, these boats have 4+ spots in the morgue as deaths on cruise ships are a common occurrence for numerous reasons. I appreciate the reporting on the LGBTQ community but jumping to write this while everything is so speculative (and referencing knowingly bias lawyers) seems like we are just providing fodder to the tired narrative that “gays do drugs more.” No. Young people do. People who like dancing and partying do. People who don’t have kids at home do. There are numerous variables here that would could analyze. I don’t understand why Instinct is jumping to take this conversation up without facts. The truth is, Atlantis has care teams in place. They respond swiftly. And they don’t allow or condone use of illicit substances – but the people who want these will find a way. Even if there was tragedy in this death, it doesn’t mean that is the only story to tell and propagate. Maybe focusing on the community they provide and the unique experience of being around 100% acceptance would be a better message. But that won’t get you the clicks.
Thanks Michael for your response. The narrative is be safe and there are chances people are taking with their lives. Yes, it happens on EDM cruises, but this is not an EDM cruise magazine. We as well mention that deaths do happen on other cruise ships, so thanks for repeating that.
Gays do more drugs, and people who do drugs like other people around them to be on drugs too (whether they want to take them or not): https://www.samhsa.gov/data/sites/default/files/reports/rpt41899/2022_LGB_Brief_Final_06_07_23.pdf
Lol 😂 his official source of news is Reddit. OMG did he even study journalism?
OMG did you even see that we reached out to Royal Caribbean because of the comments on social media? Go judge someone else.
The man that died was my brother. My sister posted on that Reddit. This is not speculation.
I am so sorry for your loss. You know your brother better than anyone but I would hazard that you not assume he took these drugs himself and I would push for an investigation. That is how I would like my family to proceed if this ever happened to me. I haven’t done drugs since college but I have been dosed by other gay men more times than I care to remember, (or even can remember with some drugs). I always proceed with the assumption that when young gay men overdose they did not take the drugs themselves. While addicts often overdose, it seems to me that regular casual drug users are far too cautious to let this happen to themselves.
I was on the cruise and yes, there were a few alpha calls.
However you’d think by the article that only gay people take drugs. There are plenty of straight party cruises where drugs are rife.
Sadly some people overdo it but this happens on land as well as at sea
Not sure where you got the tone that only gay people take drugs on cruises.
As a gay man who came of age in the early 80’s,I don’t condone this at all.Be it accidental or not.The gay lifestyle is not conducive to longevity.I don’t like crowds,bars or smokers.The young people today will not have long lifespans.
I’ve been on several gay cruises like this and thankfully nothing like this has ever happened. So very sad if true.
They dont publicize deaths on cruise ships.People die everyday,even on straight cruises.This only makes news because its a gay cruise.I am not the typical gay man anyway.
There are many reports of people passing away while on cruises gay, straight, other chartered ones.
Just so we’re all on the same page, that Jim guy from “CruiseLawNews” is a literal ambulance chaser… for cruise ships. He stirs s**t up about cruises non-stop and tries to sue the cruise lines constantly. He posts nothing but negative, inflated “articles” as if they’re news in an attempt to shame the cruise line. He’s biased, jumps to conclusions, doesn’t verify facts, and is basically a troll.
While something probably did happen on this cruise, Jim Walker has a reputation for skewing the “news” and should not be trusted as a reliable source of any information. Ever.
Thanks for the message, yes, we see that the lawyers are quick on this
Thank you for replying and posting this information. It is truly awful when people try to make money out of someone else’s tragedy
Sure, he is has “inflated” this as if it is news that a young gay man has died and he is blowing it way out of proportion, after all what is so negative? /s
Do you even realize how what you have written sounds?