On Sulpicio Lines
I’ve always wanted to rant about Sulpicio Lines but due to the recent Princess of the Stars disaster, I’ve put this entry off a few weeks.
Anyway, I’d just would like to share some of my experiences with Sulpicio Line’s Dipolog Princess (DP). This ferry has been around for as long as I could remember.
Experience #1:
I was still a freshman in college, I boarded DP one Saturday night from Cebu to Iligan City. There was no problem when it left Cebu but it suddenly stopped 4 hours after departure due to engine trouble. It started running again 5 hours later. It was supposed to arrive in Iligan at 6:00AM, but due to the problem, we reached Iligan Bay at around 1:00PM. We were about a hundred meters from the port but the engine died again. The problem wasn’t fixed so they left us with no option but to transfer to a tugboat to the port. It was my first time riding a tugboat and jumping from the ship to the tugboat was really horrifying!
Experience #2:
DP is the only ship that goes to Iligan City from Tagbilaran City. My father died in Tagbilaran City so we had to stay a few days in Bohol waiting for the ship. DP was supposed to leave Bohol on Wednesday but, due to engine trouble (again), we left Bohol the next day. We were mourning and provoked by the ship’s delay. These drove me to my limit and I actually lost my temper when I found out that some people had the same bed number as my family and me. Moreover, we weren’t able to get the economy accommodation, so we got the tourist ones. The room was supposed to be air-conditioned but we weren’t able to get some sleep because the air-conditioning system was broken!
The only good thing I can say about Sulpicio Lines is that they serve good meals. Honestly, I like some of the Sulpicio Lines ferries, especially Princess of the Ocean. But they should let go of Dipolog Princess.
I think that not only Sulpicio lines, but also most of the ferries in the Philippines have major problems. Most (if not all) of the ships are old and have poor maintenance. Serious mechanical inspections are only done when tragedies happen. Security is tightened only when a bombing incident occurs. I just hope they won’t wait for another incident to happen before they do something.
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July 18th, 2008 at 6:25 pm
Fren,
Sulpicio din ang may-ari ng MV Princess of the Stars na lumubog eh. Siguro Sulpicio lines should consider upgrading their gears or determine which ship needs to retire from service.
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July 20th, 2008 at 11:39 am
After Dona Paz, I never rode on any Sulpicio Lines owned ship! That shipping company is really disgusting. Cagayan Princess is always almost empty because people in Cagayan de Oro always choose WG&A Super Ferry.
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July 29th, 2008 at 2:37 am
Is there no advocate for the families, regardless of citizenship, waiting in agony to find the fate of their loved ones? It seems as if Sulpicio Lines is just stalling and stalling with one thing after the other. This is undeniably a gross imposition on the rights of the deceased and their families to allow that ship to just sit and stagnate in the water when it is full of human remains. Our citizens, any citizens, are worth so much more than that and the family from the U.S., like many others, has been through an agonizing and frustrating ordeal with no end in sight. This is a hideous and disgusting way to treat human beings and in essence, their bodies are being held captive. This situation desperately needs to be brought to the attention of any international law/humanitarian rights advocate and news entity who is willing to listen, and I am working hard to raise awareness as such. If that were a Carnival (i.e.) ship off of Bermuda or the U.S.S. Badger full of bodies in Lake Michigan, do you think there would be so much delay? Never!!! Regardless of the country of registry or parent company. This is an enormous travesty of justice to the victims and their families. Let alone the fact that there are citizens of other countries missing in the mess. I do not understand why nobody is overriding the shipping company on this and taking over operations to make retrieving the remains in an ecologically safe manor THE immediate and top priority and play the blame game later. All the rights here seem to belong to Sulpicio, and they are not doing ANYTHING to remedy the situation at hand. Apparently nobody can touch the ship but the owner. Meanwhile, the divers have been called off and they now want to re-float, which would take 3 months, or tow the ship, which would take about a month, to unload the cargo and the bodies. These decisions are all conveniently being left up to Sulpicio, who is doing NOTHING. Why they have ANY rights at this point is not clear, as the investigations have already found that two of the ballasts were empty. It is also speculated that the cargo was not properly secured and may have contributed to the capsizing of the ship. Seems to me the right thing to do to begin retrieving the bodies would be for someone to step in and take over and bring in a ship builder-maybe the company that constructed this ship-to salvage the vessel by dismantling the exposed hull. Apparently they know where the cargo is located in the ship and as of yet it is not leaking, so they CAN get around it. With all the technology and engineering capabilities out there today, there is no excuse for this to be prolonged. Meanwhile, the ship remains upside down, submerged, physically in tact, and potentially full of hundreds of human remains, and any moron would know they are not going to magically become any more easily identifiable. I think what I find most shocking and appalling is that this situation gets worse and worse and the media attention in the rest of the world, just is not there. The rest of the world doesn’t seem to know or care that there is a boat full of bodies just sitting in the water. The only reason I am up to speed on the horrid details is that some of those lost are the family of someone that I care about very much. So I scan the local news outlets there all day long hoping to find some closure for them, along with the other hundreds of families, hoping to find news of a resolution. However, instead of hope, I see gross negligence. The disgusting, horrendous, deplorable corporate and socially unacceptable conduct of a shipping company that basically sent 800 people to a watery grave and really doesn’t seem to notice. For now, all I can do is try to raise awareness in hopes that someone will step up to the plate and end this atrocity. Let these grieving families identify there loved ones so they can mourn them and find closure. The media is the best outlet to raise awareness. Each day the bodies are left on the boat is a day too late. I would give my vote to Sulpicio as “Worst Corporate Citizen Ever.”