yacht horror stories

The global authority in superyachting

NEWSLETTERS
Yachts Home
The Superyacht Directory
Yacht Reports
Brokerage News
The largest yachts in the world
The Register
Yacht Advice
Yacht Design
12m to 24m yachts
Monaco Yacht Show
Builder Directory
Designer Directory
Interior Design Directory
Naval Architect Directory
Yachts for sale home
Motor yachts
Sailing yachts
Explorer yachts
Classic yachts
Sale Broker Directory
Charter Home
Yachts for Charter
Charter Destinations
Charter Broker Directory
Destinations Home
Mediterranean
South Pacific
Rest of the World
Boat Life Home
Owners' Experiences
Conservation and Philanthropy
Interiors Suppliers
Owners' Club
Captains' Club
BOAT Showcase
BOAT Presents
Events Home
World Superyacht Awards
Superyacht Design Festival
Design and Innovation Awards
Young Designer of the Year Award
Artistry and Craft Awards
Explorer Yachts Summit
Ocean Talks
The Ocean Awards
BOAT Connect
Between the bays
Golf Invitational
BOATPro Home
Superyacht Insight
Global Order Book
Premium Content
Product Features
Testimonials
Pricing Plan
Tenders & Equipment

The spookiest ghost ship stories from around the world

Spectral schooners, mysterious disappearances and an ill-fated captain and crew, lost to an icy fate; ghost ship stories have existed for as long as humanity has taken to the sea. And in the spirit of Halloween, BOAT has rounded up the scariest selection...

Although the earth's warming temperatures mean that the Northwest Passage is now free (albeit not easy) to sail through, this was not always the case. The search for the elusive passage claimed the lives of many ambitious sailors in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries; keen to find an alternate trade route to Asia, their ships would become lodged in Arctic ice, sealing their fate in the Great White North. The Octavius was one of many to meet such a fate, but the grim scenes found on board was what made the story of this ghost ship particularly terrifying.

The three-masted schooner departed from England in 1761, but was found off the coast of Greenland in 1775. Her captain had, unluckily decided to try and use the then nonexistent Northwest Passage (which superyacht Rosehearty has since cleared) to return home. The five men who boarded the derelict ship in 1775 were confronted with a ghostly sight; the entire 28-man crew was below deck, but frozen to death. The icy figure of the ship's captain was discovered sitting at his desk, writing in his logbook, pen still in hand. The last logbook entry was in 1762 – the ghost ship and her crew had been lost at sea for 13 years before being found.

SS Ourang Medan

One of the most notorious ghost ship stories, the tale of the SS Ourang Medan is shrouded in mystery. The legend goes that in 1947, a cargo ship off the coast of Indonesia put out a distress call with the words: "All officers including captain are dead lying in chartroom and bridge. Possibly whole crew dead." Before help could arrive, a second message was radioed in with just two words: "I die."

Rescue workers who boarded the ship discovered to their horror that the crew members were indeed deceased, with their bodies contorted and arms outstretched as if fending off an attacker – but without any signs of injury. An engine room fire then caused the ship to be abandoned and eventually sink, taking its ghastly secret, and any chance of an autopsy investigation, to Davy Jones’ locker.

Later reports contradicted this supernatural tale, however, with a 1948 newspaper article citing a survivor who blamed the deaths on a leak of its deadly cargo – sulphuric acid. What’s more, there is no record of the SS Orang Medan in Lloyd’s Registry, leading some to conclude that this ghost story is pure fabrication.

Mary Celeste

No ghost ship compendium would be complete without the tale of the brigantine Mary Celeste . Her fate has passed into maritime myth thanks in large part to a short story by Dr Arthur Conan Doyle, the writer and creator of Sherlock Holmes . What we do know is that the Mary Celeste had sailed from New York on 7 November, 1872 bound, for Genoa with a cargo of alcohol. Almost a month later on the afternoon of 5 December, she was spotted drifting somewhere between the Azores and Portugal by Dei Gratia , another brigantine on an Atlantic crossing.

Captain Morehouse of the Dei Gratia knew Captain Briggs of the Mary Celeste to be a capable sailor and was suspicious. He ordered a boarding party to the Mary Celeste and his crew found a deserted ship in seaworthy condition. Captain Morehouse split his crew and sailed the Mary Celeste to Gibraltar. To this date, the fate of Captain Briggs, his wife, child and crew of seven remains unsolved. Whether Briggs abandoned ship because of bad weather or whether there is a more sinister reason for their disappearance, will never be known.

This more recent tale concerns the catamaran Kaz II , which was found deserted off the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. The 9.8-metre yacht was seen drifting by a helicopter on 18 April 2007, a few days after she had set off from Airlie Beach, Queensland. When she was boarded on 20 April, the maritime authorities found everything normal, but no crew. Food was on the table, a laptop was on and the engine was running. The only indication of something out of the ordinary was a ripped sail.

Conspiracy theories as to the fate of the three men – inexperienced sailors in their 50s and 60s – abounded, ranging from pirates, insurance fraud and even paranormal activity. A coroner’s court found something far more prosaic. The three friends had drowned after falling overboard as a result of their lack of nautical nous, though one cannot say for certain, as their bodies have never been found.

The body of German sailor Manfred Fritz Bajorat was found slumped over the desk of his yacht Sajo in early 2016. The grim discovery was made by fishermen when they boarded the drifting yacht off Barabo in the Surigeo del Sur province. After a post-mortem was carried out, local police said there were no signs of foul play and it was believed Bajorat died of natural causes, possibly a heart attack. It is thought his yacht had been adrift for many months before it was discovered and the dry, salty conditions on board had caused his body to mummify.

The Flying Dutchman

The most iconic ghost ship in maritime culture is certainly The Flying Dutchman . The legend tells that this haunted ship is unable to make port and is cursed to sail the seas forevermore. The fable of this Dutch man-of-war ship first appeared in the seventeenth century. The supposed captain of the ghost ship was apparently inspired by stories of Barend Fokke, whose exceptionally fast trips from the Netherlands to Java were presumed to be aided by the devil.

Sightings of the phantom ship, which are said to occur in bad weather, are supposed to be bad omens for those who pass her. The most famous report of The Flying Dutchman was by King George V, who reportedly saw her "all aglow" along the coast of Australia as they were sailing in the Bass straight. The ship has become a famous trope in literature, art and movies since; she inspired Richard Wagner's opera of the same name, and more recently made an appearance in the 2006 film Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest .

Carroll A Deering

The fate of the crew of five-masted schooner Carroll A Deering , which ran aground off North Carolina in January 1921, was investigated by no less than five US government departments. In the process, it became one of the most infamous maritime mysteries of all time. The ship was returning to Norfolk, Virginia after delivering a consignment of coal to Rio de Janeiro. The captain, W. B. Wormwell, had been drafted in on the first leg of the journey due to the illness of the original captain and was said to have an uneasy relationship with the crew. Thus, when the Carroll A Deering was found deserted on February 4, 1921, mutiny was suspected. The ship’s navigation equipment and lifeboats had gone but, to add the mystery, food had been prepared and left uneaten.

Japanese ghost ships

The Japanese Coast Guard has reported around 200 instances of ghost ships over the last few years. However, unlike the Bermuda Triangle, the boats have been found, and with human cargo on board. One such incident happened off Fukui, a port city on the main Honshu island. The decomposing corpses of seven people were found on a drifting wooden fishing vessel in mid-December 2020. The Japanese authorities are said to be puzzled by the fate of the "fishermen" but one theory for this incident, and the other floating ghost ships, is they were defectors from the totalitarian North Korean regime across the treacherous sea to the west.

Auspiciously timed, this ghost ship was last seen leaving a port in Taiwan on Halloween, 2002. The 20-metre boat was then found abandoned in the Timor Sea, within an 80 nautical mile range of Australia's Rowley Shoals. The fishing boat's owner had last been in touch with the captain in December of that year, but by January 2003, High Aim 6 was discovered unmanned. Strangely, the vessel was found with its engines fully fuelled and running, with all of the crew's personal belongings and provisions on board. There were also no apparent signs of struggle or damage above or below deck. The mystery remains unsolved; the only information the authorities received was from a single crew member they had managed to track down and take into custody. He claimed that the crew of High Aim 6 had mutinied, but no reason was given as to why.

HMS Resolute

HMS Resolute was a British Royal Navy ship found in 1854, abandoned and adrift, off the coast of Baffin Island in the Canadian Arctic. She had originally been sent to find the remains of another lost expedition – that of Sir John Franklin's, to locate the then-frozen Northwest Passage – but met a similar fate. HMS Resolute had become lodged in an ice floe and abandoned by the crew, of whom no trace was ever found.

An eerie scene met those who had discovered the ghostly ship in 1855; the captain's cabin remained undisturbed with a teapot, bible and glasses full of liquor on the desk. A British Flag had been left draped over the chair of the ship's commander, Captain Kellett. HMS Resolute was eventually retrieved and retired in 1879. Her timbers were used to construct the Resolute desk, which has been used by almost every American president in the Oval Office since the 19th century.

The Scariest Mainstream Cruise Stories

It’s the most wonderful time of year. I’ve trawled the pits of the internet, cruise forums and tabloid newspapers to find the spookiest cruise-related stories in time for Halloween. Keep reading for a bonafide spookfest of cruise stories, including zombie cruise ships, decomposing dead bodies and other tragedies.

NO CRUISE LINES ARE NAMED IN THIS ARTICLE TO PROTECT THEIR IMAGE.

THESE ARE ALL TRUE STORIES.

Back in 2013, cruisers sailing aboard an unnamed mainstream cruise ship were enjoying the cruise of their lives in the Caribbean. As you can imagine, sunshine poured from the sky like hot honey as relaxed holidaymakers soaked up the rays and queued at the bar to buy their drinks. Being a large cruise line, drinks weren’t provided—but that’s not the horror story here. The Pool Deck was busy, bordering on crowded and the sun was so bright that there wasn’t a sunlounger available. But again, that’s not the real horror story here. The real story is much, much worse.

One night, the ship suffered a catastrophic engine fire. At the time there were 3,143 passengers on board as well as 1,086 crew, all drifting for three days in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico with, at best, patchy phone reception and limited resources to survive. Make no mistake about it, this was an absolute catastrophe for this world-famous cruise line. Their huge ship was adrift, with no land in sight and dwindling fuel supplies. Passengers feared the worst. Crew didn’t know what to do. With so many people on board, reception areas were fit to burst with people complaining. There was the very real danger of a Hunger Games scenario unfolding.

Conditions were awful. The ship was listing violently from side to side because the stabilisers weren’t working. Sea sickness became a very real problem. Food became limited. Power went. Besides the lights going out, the lifts not working and power outlets being unavailable, temperatures soared with the onboard air conditioning out of use. Even the toilets didn’t work, which isn’t ideal… especially when everybody is sea sick. As the toilets overflowed and flooded cabins, staterooms and even suites, guests were given special biobags to do their business in. There are reports that there were so many of these bags that they started piling up in the corridors. This massive cruise ship was now a floating biohazard.

In an interview with The Guardian, one worried fellow said of his wife on the ship: “They’re sleeping on the deck, using any available resources to make a makeshift centre to give them some privacy, keeping her and her friends together. The lean of the ship makes it difficult for them to walk. It makes it difficult for them to get any sort of rest, any sort of comfort. Besides the times they can get cellular reception from the ship is the only connection, but it’s sketchy at best”.

Salvation came in the form of two tugboats who towed the ship back to the Bahamas, but not before a tow rope snapped and delayed their arrival. On a Friday morning, refugees from the wretched ship were finally allowed to disembark. They will never forget the world’s first and last “Poop Cruise”.

In the spring of 2023, aboard a huge cruise ship, holidaymakers were blissfully unaware of the tragedy that was about to unfold. The ship sailed through the glistening Caribbean waters, its passengers enjoying the gentle sway of the ocean and the indulgence of all-inclusive amenities. With each passing day, the horizon seemed endless, a perfect escape from the stresses of daily life. But beneath the surface of this serene voyage lay a dark, heart-wrenching secret.

A 75-year-old man had boarded the ship with his wife for what was supposed to be the start of a beautiful vacation during a happy retirement. After years of hard work, he could finally sit back, escape the stress of daily life and enjoy the delights of a cruise with his darling wife. Devastatingly, he suffered a sudden massive heart attack in the middle of the night. Despite the efforts of onboard medical staff, he tragically passed away leaving behind his grieving wife. After much persuasion by the crew on board, the man’s widow made the incredibly difficult decision of deciding to stay on the cruise until disembarkation in Florida six days later. The alternative was to leave the ship, husband’s body and all, in Puerto Rico and repatriate from there. But the staff of this large cruise ship insisted. As is protocol with large cruise ships, often carrying thousands of passengers, there are morgues which are designed to hold dead bodies for the remainder of a trip. It was a decision she would soon regret.

The ship’s morgue, for one reason or another, was out of service. In a shocking turn of events, it was later revealed that the man’s body was placed in a drink cooler located in a storage area below deck. The temperature was far too warm to prevent decomposition, and the makeshift storage area was used as both a refrigeration unit for drinks and, now disturbingly, a resting place for the deceased.

His body was left there, untouched and unnoticed, for six excruciating days as the cruise continued its journey. When the ship finally arrived in Florida, a funeral home employee came on board to collect Robert’s body. What they discovered was beyond horrifying. Inside the cooler, drinks had been casually stacked nearby, and Robert’s body—still inside a body bag—was decomposing rapidly, lying on a floor pallet. The decomposition had advanced so significantly that the family’s hopes for an open-casket funeral were completely dashed. His body was no longer in any condition to be displayed, robbing them of the chance to say goodbye in the manner they had planned.

Grief turned into outrage. The family later filed a lawsuit for $1 million, accusing the cruise line of gross negligence and mishandling the situation, turning their tragedy into a nightmare. In the end, it wasn’t just the heart attack that devastated the Jones family; it was the callous, thoughtless actions that followed, leaving them with a memory far worse than the sorrow of his passing.

Disaster struck on the second day of a 14-day Antarctic expedition aboard a cruise ship full of defined explorers—although none of them knew it. A water pipe, in a storeroom deep in the belly of the ship, burst. Every single spare roll of toilet paper on board was soaked. Solutions were needed. These folk faced a long 12 more days at sea without a fresh resupply of bog roll.

Facing imminent catastrophe, the crew discreetly shuffled what little toilet paper remained, swapping rolls between “low-use” and “high-use” cabins to keep things running smoothly. It was a delicate balancing act, with supplies running dangerously low by the end of the trip. Fortunately, not a single guest noticed the crisis. Since then, the ship has adopted a new policy: toilet paper is now hidden in individual cabins rather than stored centrally, ensuring that such a close call never happens again.

WANT TO AVOID A HORROR STORY AT SEA?

Luxury and ultra-luxury cruising is the only way you’ll get the service and cruising experience you deserve. Go luxury for your next cruise and have everything included in your fare, with smaller ships and fewer capacity on board meaning more crew attention on you. Call 0161 513 8200 to book today.

These charter guests came straight from hell

For this year’s Halloween special, we thought we’d try and shock some of you into submission. This is an extract from the diary of a Superyacht Stewardess onboard a large Motor Yacht… Read on, if you dare!

Armed with radios and our biggest smiles, we waved off the Captain as he went to collect the guests for our New Year’s BVI charter. It was number five of ten-week-long, back-to-back charters. Exhausted but exhilarated from the high of an amazing Christmas trip, we were fueled by adrenaline, ready to embrace our new guests.

The week began with the wild children fighting with black Sharpies… on our white leather sofas. Without jumping to conclusions too much, it was clear that parenting skills were questionable in this case. “Seven more days…” I said in my head as I walked by, smiling sweetly.

Day two: The nanny was sunbathing on the bow, the parents were asleep, and the kids were roaming free. The two-year-old decided to start climbing the steps, clearly in the “danger zone” that had been laid out on day one. Smack! Luckily her fall came only from the third step, and she was uninjured, but somehow this still didn’t prompt the nanny to reconsider the role of actually doing her job.

Day three: We were all puzzled as to why this group had chosen a yachting holiday as none of them seemed to be remotely interested in the water. On day 3 there was a thunderous crash and as we ran around the boat to see what was going on we noticed two heads bobbing about down below. One seemed pleased with the surroundings while the other certainly did not. The man had decided to take the seven-year-old boy for a swim and this has been met with a very loud protest indeed. After much wailing and shrieking a towel was demanded and dutifully provided. Having removed the salt from his eyes the boy promptly dropped the towel in the sea and scrambled out of the water to safety. The man went swimming alone after that.

Day four: The parents went out to dinner, and the nanny to bed, leaving the kids unattended (what a surprise). Dealing with the shrieking children was painful enough but then the parents returned from the restaurant and proudly showed off the goodies they had picked up whilst off the boat. Stolen goodies. Wine glasses, pens, silverware, linen napkins… In the crew mess, we wondered what they were planning to remove from the boat if this enormous haul was the result of only one night in a restaurant.

Day five, New Year’s Eve: Anchored at the best spot at Foxy’s, Jost Van Dyke, we were awakened at 5am by screaming children. I lay in bed, thinking surely the parents or nanny would do something. After twenty minutes of the screeching, I gave in and went to see what was going on. The brats had managed to open the porthole and had thrown out the boat’s Apple TV remotes. I put them in “time out”, had a stern word, and shut the door behind me. By now, the crew needed sleep and screaming children were not our responsibility.

By midday, the parents rolled out of bed and the woman’s hair was the brightest shade of blue hair you’ve ever seen. Was this real? We all radioed each other to confirm it wasn’t our delirium… Our fears were confirmed upon entering the master bathroom. Blue. Dye. EVERYWHERE. The white marble counters, walls, and the pristine white sink were splattered with blue dye.

The final day: Drained but still smiling because FINALLY these people are getting the hell off our boat. It all becomes worth it at the end of the week knowing the captain will be handed an envelope & the guests will become a story that one day we will be able to laugh about. Of course, that’s not what happened on this trip. The ‘envelope’ was handed to me. Only the envelope was actually a plastic bag. I looked inside to find a dress belonging to the lady that I’d complimented earlier in the week. That was my tip. The captain got a pair of size 14 Havaianas, but the best was our deckhand, an XL shirt for a petite guy. The receipt in the bag meant he could exchange the size… in theory. Off he went to greet a horrified shop owner, mumbling “Sir, this wasn’t paid for, we’re going to have to take it back from you. Sorry.”

It didn’t end there. The next day, preparing for the next imminent charter, we were all mortified to find that the entire supply of Bvlgari toiletries had vanished and so had the $300 Ralph Lauren scatter pillows from the master cabin, conveniently the same shade of blue as the lady’s new hairdo.

Lauren Loudon

Related articles, rookie realities: there’s no hot tub time machine, champagne vs prosecco: what sets them apart, doing table service right. 12 top tips, the special skill you have to have if you’re going to be a yacht chef.

Join our Newsletter

Your Name First Last
Your Email *

Privacy | Credits | Get in Touch

0, text: error()">

0, text: error(), css: errorCssClass">

Reset your password

Enter your email address or username and we’ll send you a link to reset your password

Check your inbox

An email with a link to reset your password was sent to the email address associated with your account

Provide email

Please enter your email to complete registration

Activate to continue

Your account isn't active yet. We've emailed you an activation link. Please check your inbox and click the link to activate your account

0, text: error" style="display: none;">

0, text: success" style="display: none;">

Relationships

The Bored Panda iOS app is live! Fight boredom with iPhones and iPads here .

Partnership
Success stories
--> -->