![]() The next morning, tabloids feasted on the overnight debacle. Venture’s promise of chauffeured limousine rides home for everyone came to nothing. The tugs dumped the cruise refugees on Staten Island, then took off. After the crew opened the hull’s watertight doors, 250 passengers clambered down rope ladders, jumping down to the decks of tugboats pulled up below. By now the America had dropped anchor near Coney Island, and the captain acceded to the mob’s demands. The angriest passengers picked fistfights with the crew. Homeless at sea, they massed outside the purser’s office and began chanting: “We want to get off!”Ĭonditions deteriorated quickly. America, one woman later said, was a “floating garbage can.”īad as the cabins were, the factor that tipped anger into chaos was this: at least 100 paying passengers never found cabins at all. While dismayed passengers darted around trying to find a spot to settle, so did a phalanx of cockroaches and rats. Beds lacked bedsheets-and often mattresses, too. Many discovered that faulty plumbing had flooded their cabins. Fares for a two-night cruise to nowhere started at $99-a fare so low it was hard to believe.īut now that the voyage was underway, passengers couldn’t believe the predicament they were in. ![]() ![]() Venture promised no end of onboard pampering, but it was the ticket prices that seduced. America, a shopworn ocean liner restored to its prewar elegance. Little wonder so many locals in need of a summer escape noticed Venture Cruise Lines’ advertising for the S.S. With crime rates soaring and its economy in the ditch, New York was a difficult place to live in 1978.
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