there's this cruise ship called the Explorer and it hit an iceberg and i think it sank.
i don't think anyone died thank god. this isn't much info, but add more plz. i want to learn more about it. thanx. bye.

yes the cruse ship explorer was doing a cruse in the antartaica with only 150 odd passngers and all were saved.

but the vessel hit and ice berg duo to poor navigation from what i have heared as the captain is under investigation.

the vessel has sunk on its side from the last pictures i saw the ship rests on its port side in the war and could possible be slavaged.

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — A Canadian cruise ship struck submerged ice off Antarctica and began sinking, but all 154 passengers and crew, Americans and Britons among them, took to lifeboats and were plucked to safety by a passing cruise ship.

The stricken MS Explorer finally disappeared from view Friday evening, about 20 hours after the predawn accident near Antarctica's South Shetland Islands, the Chilean navy said.

No serious injuries were reported although passengers reportedly endured subfreezing temperatures for several hours as they waited in bobbing lifeboats for a Norwegian liner that took them to a Chilean military base in the region. Officials said there were a few minor cases of hypotheria.

The Explorer struck submerged ice and began taking on water through its cracked hull early Friday, authorities said. Susan Hayes of G.A.P. Adventures of Toronto, which owned the vessel, initially described the damage as a fist-sized hole, but the Argentine navy later said it observed "significant" damage to the hull.

The voyage was inspired by the polar travels of Ernest Shackleton, the famed expedition leader who made repeated forays there before dying of a heart attack while trying to sail around the icy continent in 1922, G.A.P. said.

Throughout the day, Chilean aerial photographs showed the ship listing heavily, its white superstructure and red hull starkly visible against the gray, choppy waters and overcast skies. The navy eventually lost sight of the ship and wreckage indicated it had gone under completely, according to a navy press officer who declined be identified in accordance with department policy.

"Our units in the area aren't seeing anything," he told The Associated Press by telephone. "The Explorer is not visible any longer."

Hayes said 91 passengers had been aboard, including at least 23 Britons, 17 Dutch, 14 Americans and 10 Canadians. The ship also carried nine expedition staff members and a crew of 54.

The group calmly abandoned ship when the captain's order came and pumps helped keep the ship stable for an orderly evacuation, Hayes said.

Arnvid Hansen, captain of the Norwegian liner Nordnorge, said his ship ferried the passengers and crew to a Chilean air force base on King George Island in Antarctic waters near southernmost South America. Officials were hoping the weather would clear enough to airlift Chile's southernmost city of Punta Arenas on Saturday.

"The rescue operation ran very smoothly," the 54-year-old captain told The Associated Press by shipboard telephone from the Nordnorge.

A U.S. woman said in an e-mail to family members that she witnessed the high-seas drama from aboard the Nordnorge.


"We were a rescue ship," said Jennifer Enders of Covina, Calif., who was traveling with her husband Robert. "It is really scary to see a ship sinking out your porthole. The people were in the water in lifeboats for 4 hours and it is cold outside."

She said it was depressing to watch the ship listing "and lifeboats scurrying around collecting the passengers from the Explorer. Our ship stayed until a naval ship arrived."

G.A.P Adventures is a tour company that provides excursions with an environmental focus. The Explorer was on a 19-day circuit of Antarctica and the Falkland Islands letting passengers observe penguins, whales and other wildlife while getting briefings from experts on the region.

Operators had boasted that Explorer -- a ship only 246 feet in length with a shallow bottom and ice-hardened hull -- could go places other vessels could not. It alternated seasons between waters of the two poles and was the first cruiser to take passengers to Antarctica and through the Northwest Passage, according to G.A.P. Adventure's Web site.

Hayes noted that traveling to Antarctica is always risky.

"There is ice in the area. Obviously it's a hazard of the area. But it's highly unusual (that the ship would hit the ice). This has never happened to us," he said.

Argentine Explorer passenger Andrea Salas was quoted as saying those aboard initally felt a minor bump. "Then we heard the captain announcing that there was another iceberg," and there was a second larger collision, she told Radio Continental in Buenos Aires.

An Argentine rescue and command center received the first distress call at 12:30 a.m. EST Friday from the Explorer amid reports it was taking on water despite efforts to use onboard pumps, said Capt. Juan Pablo Panichini, an Argentine navy spokesman.

A navy statement said that the captain ordered passengers to abandon ship about 90 minutes after the first call and that passengers and crew boarded eight semi-rigid lifeboats and four life rafts, with the captain leaving the ship later.

An Argentine navy statement said the Explorer was about 500 miles southeast of Ushuaia, the southernmost Argentine city and a jumping-off point for cruise ships and supply vessels for Antarctica. Seas were calm and winds light at the time of the accident, officials said.

Last Feb. 1, the Nordnorge evacuated 294 passengers, including 119 Americans from a sister Norwegian cruise ship, the MS Nordkapp, which ran aground off a remote Antarctic island. The Nordkapp later pulled off the rocks under its own power and authorities said those passengers were never in danger.

i hope this is a great help for you mate!!!!!!!!!!!!

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