Princess Chef Reported Missing

mercedes · December 1, 2009

A 31-year old chef working onboard the Coral Princess was feared to have gone overboard from the cruise ship while it was sailing from Aruba to Cartagena, Colombia last Thursday. According to Princess Cruises spokeswoman Julie Benson, the chef, Angelo Faliva, from Cremona, Italy, was last seen on deck at 8:30 a.m. Thursday morning talking to a fellow crew member.

Flavia's family, however told the Associated Press that they had been told that Flavia had unexpectedly left work at 8:15 p.m. the previous evening while working the dinner shift and had not been seen since. They also said that they had been told a life jacket was missing from the ship and that the emergency light and reflective tape had been removed from the life jacket.

The Colombian Coast Guard station in Cartagena, Colombia was alerted about 10:00 a.m. Thursday morning that a person had been reported missing from the Coral Princess and that the person had last been seen the previous evening while the ship was sailing near La Guajira, Colombia. They received a second report from the cruise ship later that day indicating that Flavia had been seen again early Thursday morning.

The Colombian Coast Guard initiated a search Thursday afternoon using several boats and a helicopter but as of Sunday afternoon, had not found any evidence of the missing man. The Coral Princess is on a 14-day cruise from Miami to Acapulco, Mexico.