River Cruise Ship Collides with Freighter on the Danube

On Saturday, five passengers aboard the river cruise boat Prinzessin Isabella were injured when she collided with a cargo ship on the Danube. 

Early Saturday morning, at a position near the river port of Ismail, Ukraine, the Isabella collided with the coastal freighter Blue Star 1, which was bound upstream towards the port of Galati, Romania. Five cruise passengers were injured, including two who were hospitalized. The cruise boat carried on towards the nearest port. No pollution was reported. 

Bystander imagery suggests that the Prinzessin Isabella suffered damage to a limited number of upper-deck cabins on the starboard side amidships. 

Prinzessin Isabella is operated by a German tour company catering primarily to the domestic market. The vessel is crewed by Ukrainian and Slovakian nationals, according to local media.

As of Tuesday, the Blue Star 1 was moored near Galati. The Prinzessin Isabella was under way, bound for Passau, Germany. 

Saturday's collision was the second serious river cruise casualty on the Danube since June, when the tourist boat Hableany collided with the river cruise ship Viking Sigyn in Budapest, sinking the smaller boat and leaving 28 dead. The master of the Viking Sigyn, identified as 64-year-old Ukrainian national Yuriy Chaplinsky, has been arrested by Hungarian police on suspicion of “endangering waterborne traffic resulting in multiple deaths.”