Royal Caribbean’s M.S. ‘Allure’ Sinks Carnival Cruise Vessel That Crossed Into Disputed Waters

In the latest clash between rivals that have long vied for control of highly prized cruise routes, a barrage of cannon fire from Royal Caribbean’s M.S. Allure of the Seas sank a Carnival Cruise Line ship that crossed into disputed waters off the coast of the Bahamas, sources said Thursday.The Allure, an Oasis-class recreational vessel with a standing crew of around 2,300, opened fire on Carnival’s M.S. Magic after it allegedly ignored repeated warnings not to approach Coco Cay, a private island owned by Royal Caribbean. After sustaining several direct hits, the enemy ship’s hull reportedly ruptured, immediately flooding its bingo hall and spa with seawater, collapsing several theme restaurants, and ultimately killing all 3,675 guests on board.
“By approaching within three nautical miles of Coco Cay, the M.S. Magic was in direct violation of the terms of the 2011 Caribbean Nights cease-fire agreement,” said Captain David Beeman of the Allure, stating that the attack was necessary to safeguard the recreational interests of the customers he is sworn to serve. “Per standard procedure, our limbo emcee first alerted the Magic that it had entered our territorial waters by issuing a verbal warning and blasting conga music over our PA system. When the ship refused to change course, we proceeded to launch a broadside from our starboard cannons, delivering a direct hit to their most crucial facilities, including the engine room, water slide, and Red Frog rum bar.”
“We suffered just one casualty ourselves, losing a tango instructor to friendly fire,” he added.
Pulling up alongside the smaller enemy vessel, the 1,187-foot Allure reportedly extended its powerful battery of guns from the portholes of a lower-deck theater currently staging Mamma Mia! Witnesses said Magic patrons standing in line for the 24-hour seafood buffet had little time to take cover before the Allure opened fire, scattering body parts and shrimp scampi all over the ship’s pool deck and mini-golf course.
“When the first shells hit, you could see blasted sections of the hull, bloody scraps of cargo shorts, and flaming flip-flops raining down into the ocean all around,” said Allure passenger Nicole Rice, adding that a few Magic guests tried to run for safety behind overturned massage tables, but were set upon by a Royal Caribbean boarding party that had crossed over with the assistance of their ship’s zip-line and ropes-course operators. “Once the second round of fire took out the piano bar and Guy Fieri’s Burger Joint, it was pretty much all over. The Magic had just dropped anchor for the Dune Buggy Heritage Adventure Tour, so it really had no chance of escape.”
Maritime historians are calling the attack upon the Magic the deadliest encounter between rival ocean liners since the so-called Cruise Wars of the 1990s, when the wrecks of sunken pleasure vessels littered the waters from Fort Lauderdale to St. Kitts. During that era, the upstart Disney Cruise Line came to rule the waves, and marauders dressed as Pinocchio, Goofy, Tinker Bell, and other company-owned mascots were known to slit the throats of their competitors’ guests and plunder everything from bar supplies to blackjack tables to karaoke equipment.
Despite official explanations, Thursday’s attack is actually believed to be in retaliation for a 2013 incident in which a Royal Caribbean vessel on a nine-day Best of the Bahamas cruise was captured off the coast of Paradise Island. According to deck logs, its entire passenger list was impressed into service as caterers aboard Carnival’s Breeze flagship.
“I’ll never forget the sight of the Magic’s crew and guests desperately trying to bail out the Club O2 teen zone as the ship started to tilt, causing all the deck furniture, the ice cream sundae station, and those seniors on their church group trip to go sliding off into the sea,” Allure passenger Jason Heidt said. “Then I guess they lost power, because suddenly all the party lights shut off and everyone in the Punchliner comedy club went silent as the ship capsized.”
“Everyone except Joe Rogan,” Heidt continued. “He kept on telling jokes until he was completely underwater.”

String of bomb blasts hit Syria, 23 killed

A string of bomb assaults hit crosswise over for the most part government-controlled ranges of Syria on Monday, killing no less than 23 individuals and injuring handfuls more, state media said.

The impacts hit government-held Tartus and Homs, and in addition Hasakeh, which is generally controlled by Kurdish powers however where the administration keeps up a nearness.

State media said no less than 11 individuals had been slaughtered and 45 harmed in a twofold bomb assault simply outside the city of Tartus, in the beach front territory of the same name, which is a fortress of President Bashar al-Assad's administration.

"Two fear based oppressor impacts on Arzuna span, the initial an auto bomb and the second a suicide plane who exploded his hazardous belt when individuals assembled to help the injured," state TV said.

Tartus has been to a great extent saved the most noticeably awful viciousness of Syria's contention since it started with against government dissents in March 2011.

It has turned into an asylum for some Syrians escaping savagery that has dislodged over a large portion of the nation's populace.

State media likewise reported eight individuals murdered in a besieging in Hasakeh, in the upper east of the nation.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based screen, said the impact hit a checkpoint having a place with the Kurdish Asayesh security powers.

Hasakeh city has been frequently focused by the Islamic State bunch, incorporating into July, when a cruiser aircraft slaughtered no less than 16 individuals outside a bread kitchen in the city.

Monday's bombings came after advances by Turkish strengths and associated Syrian renegades ousted IS from the last extend of the Syrian-Turkish outskirt under their control.

The jihadist bunch has been losing ground to both an organization together of Kurdish and Arab contenders known as the Syrian Democratic Forces and, all the more as of late, a Turkish hostile including rebels faithful to Ankara.

– "Synchronous" assaults –

In focal Homs city, state media said no less than three individuals were murdered in an auto bomb at the passage to the Al-Zahraa neighborhood, whose inhabitants generally have a place with the same Alawite group as Assad.

Al-Zahraa has likewise been consistently focused in bomb assaults, including an overwhelming twofold bomb impact in February that slaughtered 57 individuals and was asserted by IS.

State transmission pictures from the consequence of the impact in Homs, demonstrating rubble strewn in the city and smoke ascending from the singed stays of vehicles.

Another bomb assault was likewise provided details regarding the Al-Sabura street west of the capital Damascus, with state media saying one individual had been murdered and three harmed in that shelling.

The Observatory said that assault focused on a checkpoint and gave a toll of three dead.

Observatory executive Rami Abdel Rahman said the impacts gave off an impression of being facilitated.

"Unmistakably these assaults were concurrent and they all focused on security posts," he told AFP.

More than 290,000 individuals have been executed in Syria since March 2011, and millions uprooted by the battling.

Progressive rounds of global transactions went for locate a political arrangement have neglected to hold up under natural product, however US Secretary of State John Kerry and his Russian partner Sergei Lavrov are because of resume talks on stemming the viciousness Monday.

Chibok girls: Split in Boko Haram threatens swap deal

There were solid signs on Monday that the Federal Government was in an issue over the group of the Boko Haram organization, it ought to hold chats with.

The PUNCH accumulated that the Federal Government had in the previous four months been holding converses with individuals from the order with a perspective to securing the arrival of the Chibok young ladies.

It was, be that as it may, learnt that the matter reached a crucial stage two weeks back with the factionalisation of the order.

A top government official, who trusted in The PUNCH, said that as opposed to the conviction of numerous individuals, the arrival of the young ladies was highest in the psyche of President Muhammadu Buhari.

He conceded that there had been offers by a few individuals from the group to discharge the young ladies, however the legislature was being watchful.

The source expressed, "We would prefer not to commit the error the past organization made when its transaction with the group did not prompt the arrival of the young ladies. We are still in a quandary on which of the two groups if we arrange with. We should affirm that the offers are certifiable."

The order had on August 3 split with the ISIS naming Abu Musab al-Barnawi as the new pioneer of Boko Haram.

In a meeting with al-Barnawi in its Al-Naba online week by week magazine, ISIS presented him as Boko Haram new pioneer.

Be that as it may, a couple days after the fact, taking after the new arrangement, the recent pioneer, Abubakar Shekau, discharged a sound message in Arabic and Hausa dialects blaming al-Barnawi for attempting to organize an overthrow against him.

Shekau released el-Barnawi "as an unbeliever who approves living in an un-Islamic culture without pursuing jihad." He likewise asserted to have been deceived by some of his adherents.

In the mean time, the Minister of Information, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, in a meeting with State House reporters after a workshop sorted out for top security boss on the most proficient method to react to crisis circumstances, for example, terrorism and surge inside the Presidential Villa, Abuja on Monday, said the administration should first discover the realness of those it was conversing with.

He said, "The administration's position is clear that we are in contact with them. We are simply being watchful and mindful to guarantee that we are conversing with the right individuals particularly with the news that there is a part in the authority. Be that as it may, what is critical is the wellbeing and security of these young ladies.

"The push of my announcement (on Sunday) was to guarantee the country that we are on top of the circumstance. We are not in any case simply responding to the video, we have gone a long ways past the video in conversing with the gathering as of now. Until you can discover the genuineness of those you are conversing with, you don't go into subtle elements," he said.

The priest said the position of government was that there couldn't be a conclusion to the issue of terrorism until the kidnapped young ladies were saved.

On the reported arrangement by the BringBackOurGirls coalition to again coordinate on the Presidential Villa, Mohammed said, "We value their dedication to the arrival of these young ladies yet there are couple of things we have to do behind the scene. We are stating that the administration is focused on doing everything to protect these young ladies.

"We are connecting with them. By saying we are conversing with them, I am talking from a state of information. It doesn't make a difference what other individuals say. I realize that the legislature is in contact with the gathering…

"Until the arrival of this video, the exertion is not pulling in any consideration. Be that as it may, each day, the Office of the NSA and others concerned are taking a shot at it.

"For us, it is not a direct result of the arrival of the video but since of our conviction that there will be no last conclusion to Boko Haram until we can resolve the issue of these young ladies."

On his part, the Chief of Defense Staff, Lt. Gen. Abayomi Olonishakin, additionally in a meeting with columnists at the occasion, said the interest that the Federal Government swap confined Boko Haram individuals for the Chibok was a political choice that would not quit continuous military operations.

The BringBackOurGirls bunch and the guardians of the kidnapped Chibok schoolgirls had on Sunday requested that the administration regard the require a swap taking after the video of the young ladies discharged by the group on Sunday.

Olonishakin told correspondents that he would not stop the progressing military operations against the agitators which he said were going on easily.

"That (require the swap of the young ladies with Boko Haram warriors) is a political choice to be taken. The military choice is that we are proceeding with our operations. The operation is being directed suitably," he said.

The CDS however guaranteed to break down the video with a perspective to taking a position on it soon.

In the interim, the Nigerian Army has questioned two of the three individuals it announced needed on Sunday over a Boko Haram video demonstrating the Chibok young ladies.

While a lady legal counselor, Aisha Wakil, was tested at the Defense Headquarters, Abuja, Ahmed Bolori was questioned at a military sleeping quarters in Maiduguri.

It was accumulated that Wakil was questioned at the Directorate of Military Intelligence at the Defense Headquarters.

The Acting Director, Army Public Relations, Col. Sani Usman, said on the phone on Monday that Wakil had answered to the military powers to reveal more insight into what she thought about the Chibok young ladies.

At the point when requested that whether Wakil was be confined at the Directorate of Military Intelligence, he said that the issue needed to do with getting more data from the woman and not detainment.

He said that it was the perspective of the Army that the three people who were announced needed on Sunday were not saying all they knew in regards to reality concerning the Chibok young ladies.

The Acting Army representative said that it wasn't right for a few people to withhold data on the young ladies for financial advantages.

Usman likewise denied the case by Wakil that the Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai, rejected a solicitation from her to meet him with a few commandants of the Boko Haram as a major aspect of the endeavors to determine the emergency.

He said, "She (Aisha Wakil) has answered to the military. No one let you know about confinement. No. The thing is that she ought to come and shed all the more light on the things they know. From all signs, they are not saying what they know."

Bolori on his facebook page on Monday said that he reported at the military dormitory in Maiduguri at 10am.

Concurring an online medium, The Cable Wakil had before in an announcement on Monday said that the military knew where to discover her.

She said that she was astounded that the armed force made the move notwithstanding knowing where to discover her, including that she knew the Boko Haram young men.

Wakil, in her announcement, said she once met "the Chief of Army Staff and offered to bring along Boko Haram administrators for exchange, yet the armed force "did things their own particular manner."

The third individual, Salkida said in an announcement made accessible to an Abuja based media advisor outfit to security organizations, the PR Nigeria, that if the Army purchases him a ticket, he will visit Nigeria to respect the welcome.