Consider this when eating

[spadercool]

Interesting article from a Carnival employee about health scores. Kitchenware gets hidden in various places.

 

The Cruise Bruise visitor says he worked for Carnival Cruise Lines on many of their ships. He tells his story below.

 

 

 

"I must say I wasn't surprised at all when I saw the pics and article about filthy cookware being "hidden" from U.S.P.H officials. I worked for Carnival Cruise Lines for many years and the images portrayed in the pics is standard operating procedure.

 

 

 

I don't know about other cruise lines, but on Carnival Cruise Lines there is a system set up for health inspections. The system is simple and effective, especially when you want to keep your job, and have a family to maintain.

 

 

 

Do you honestly believe that the items are wrapped up to protect them from getting contaminated? They're wrapped because they're stocked up so high that they need to prevent them from falling over and injuring crew members ...which would cost them money to get medical help for that crew member, and the department that crew member worked in would be short one person, which would increase the work load for the rest of the department, and also to protect the items since these items cost money to replace.

 

 

 

An example of what goes on is like this:

 

It's almost time for inspections, the ship knows this because the time line for inspections are roughly every 6 months, but truthfully an inspection can occur at any time; so galleys, housekeeping lockers, housekeeping pantries, and so forth are "special cleaned" at the end of every cruise the night before the morning of arrival at any U.S port, be it Puerto Rico, Sitka-Alaska, Honolulu-Hawai, or Miami Fl.

 

 

 

The Galleys and pantries are management inspected and locked with their keys after it has been cleaned by the workers. Then and only then can the "team member" as Carnival calls the crew, be allowed to sign off work.

 

 

 

They don't care how long it takes to get these areas cleaned as long as it gets done, even if you go over time on your schedule. If you do go overtime on your schedule you will not be paid over time because the management will simply change your sign off time on their computer based "Fun Time", as they call it, to correspond with the sign off time you should have.

 

 

 

Whenever Health Inspectors come aboard security informs the bridge and there is a code that's called over the loudspeakers. The last code that was used on the last set of ships I was on was: "Cyrus call the bridge." It might be different on other ships, and usually changes over time as USPH officials might begin to realize this.

 

 

 

Whenever crew hears this code it means Health Inspectors are on board at this point. Security will stall them as much as possible to allow crew and management to hide or clean up stuff that might have been used. Remember that USPH doesn't only check kitchens, they also check housekeeping, so they are also involved in the preparations.

 

 

 

Work on a cruise ship is hard enough, without having management harassing you about this especially on a day like "embarkation day." But they get a nice hefty bonus if they pass the USPH inspection without problems, even the captain and hotel director gets a bonus.

 

 

 

I have worked on so many of their ships that it's hard to remember exactly where they hide their kitchen utensils, and the ships are so big that USPH will never and can never search all the ship, and they know this fact, so they hide kitchen utensils in lockers, crew areas- where officials won't even bother to check, and sometimes even crew cabins.

 

 

 

But they refrain from cabins now, because stuff tends to disappear when hidden in crew quarters. But they will hide stuff in vacant cabins, of which there are many and the list of empty cabins is in the MSA's (manager of staff administration) office.

 

 

 

But once that code is called, it's almost humorous the way that management scrambles like a chicken with it's head cut off. Remember these ships are huge, and there are many galleys and lockers and passageways all over the ship, this is the main advantage that management has over the inspectors. I hate to say it, but it is guaranteed that they will never get caught.

 

 

 

That's not the worst of it, you must remember that when the ship is at sea no one is looking, so food can be left out, or put on plates and wrapped up in plastic and left out in the open in preparation for consuming and no one will ever know.

 

 

 

Getting pics or video of this is difficult, because crew are always trying for promotions and if they catch you taking pics they will report you to management where they will get a good report for that deed and possible promotion and you on the other hand...well, you'll get a free ticket home."

[boop3]

I got a blank page :(

[Happy ks]

Your link didn't work :(

 

I do know the CDC does surprise visits to cruise ships so they can't pre-prepare their kitchens and storage areas.

[Happy ks]

Thanks for correcting this, you may have this thread deleted if the information is copyrighted, so don't be surprised if that happens.

 

It's rare a cruise ship will get a 100% score, I think it's 85% or under the DCD can suspend the ship from operation.

 

I'd trust a cruise ship more than a local restaurant, those can be horridly dirty and no gov't checks at all.

[rummenroman]

Ya true local bars and resturants aren't inspected, but they do have some pretty darn good food!

[cb at sea]

Our local restaurants are visited frequently by the board of health---I've actually looked up the scores for the restaurants we use on a regular basis...NONE have 100% scores---but neither do most of our kitchens....!

[terinzak]

Does they give cruise ships grades like they give restautants? For example, A B C

[Tucker in Texas]

here in Houston we had Maaaaaaaarvin Zindler who had a roach report every Friday night on restaurant health inspections. His day was made when they found "Slime in the Ice Machine." Mr. Zindler passed away last year and they haven't continued his roach report. He was a real character with his toupees and multi face lifts and was mimiced in "The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas."

 

Tucker in Texas

[madforcruising]

Never been on a Carnival ship, so I really can´t comment on their cleaning procedures and how they pass USPH inspections.

 

I have however been on a number of RCCL ships that entered the US again after a season overseas and prepared for the inspection.

 

It sure is a tiring effort to be made by the already hard working crew, but instead of hiding anything I see them down on their knees scrubbing everything.

 

Having all this said I believe that the described methods of hiding and working unhygienically can be found more or less (hopefully more often less) in any restaurant on land or at sea. So you better think about this whenever you eat and also whenever you buy food as the people producing food items are not better.

 

Personally I fell pretty safe in this matter at sea. Actually much safer than ashore. They know that they have a captured audience and if people get sick onboard it´s way easier to make the connection to ships food than when people get sick ashore. In addition they don´t want people onboard being sick as it´s not nearly as easy to deal with it as ashore and the treatment costs them a lot of dollars.

[Mark_K]

Well, first Cruise Bruise is hardly a good source for unbiased reporting. Second, the article makes no sense. If they do their own clean up/inspection why do they need to hide stuff all over the ship? And why would they go to the effort, it would be simpler to just clean it rather than hide it.

[madforcruising]

Well, first Cruise Bruise is hardly a good source for unbiased reporting. Second, the article makes no sense. If they do their own clean up/inspection why do they need to hide stuff all over the ship? And why would they go to the effort, it would be simpler to just clean it rather than hide it.

 

 

Don´t forget that if they are hiding all those utensils they need to have an additional clean set to show around as no inspector would be dumb enough to inspect an empty kitchen not wondering where all the stuff is;)

[ken_nyc]

Sounds like he may be an ex disgruntled employee?

[G'ma]

Does they give cruise ships grades like they give restautants? For example, A B C

 

The CDC is the bunch that inspects all cruise ships sailing in to and out of American ports. They are graded. Here is a link to the ship inspection reports which is updated regularly:

 

http://www.cdc.gov/nceh/vsp/

 

Then click on "inspection reports"......

[RetireeWannabee]

what doesn't kill me makes me stronger ;)

[BroncosFan2010]

Not terribly surprising, but good to read.

It will not really bother me when eating my next cruise meal. I keep a clean house, and a very clean kitchen at home, but I am not bothered by what might go on in a cruise ship kitchen.

[skf]

I am only bothered by the interminable length of the OP.