Experts reveal how cruise ships deal with dead bodies amid Royal Caribbean wrongful death suit

Royal Caribbean is under fire for its handling of passenger Michael Virgil, who died onboard after being served 33 drinks at one of the Navigator Of The Seas bars in December 2024, per a wrongful death lawsuit filed by his family.

Now, the family’s lawyer is accusing cruiseliner employees of stuffing the 35-year-old California father’s body in a refrigerator before continuing on their voyage, ignoring pleas from his fiancée, Connie Aguilar, to return to port in Long Beach, California.

In light of the traumatic incident, many viewers were wondering what happens to seafarers when they pass away while at sea.

How do ships store the deceased at sea?

According to insider sources, cruise ships are outfitted with hidden morgues for the deceased that are off limits to regular passengers.

These maritime mortuaries usually present as refrigerated rooms with shelves that are typically located on the ships’ lower decks near storage spaces for food, alcohol and miscellaneous ship supplies, the Point Guys explained.

In fact, professional cruise ship singer Dara Tucker made a macabre disclosure on TikTok in 2024, warning passengers should be wary when a cruise liner throws a free ice cream party.

She claimed that this is often a red flag that “more people have died on the ship than they have room for in the morgue,” forcing them to store corpses in the freezer — as was the alleged case with Virgil.

The leisure voyage vessels also come equipped with body bags and, should a death occur, they’re prepared to hold a body — or bodies — on board until the ship reaches a port large enough for arrangements to be made to return the deceased home.

What to do when someone dies on the high sea

Storing bodies is not nearly as tricky as dealing with the legal headwinds involved in a death at sea, which is communicated aboard via cryptic code words to avoid passenger panic.

Florida-based lawyer Keith Brais, whose firm specializes in injuries and incidents at sea, says that cruise companies in general are not obligated to release the findings of their investigation into passenger deaths.

This allows the pleasure boating purveyors to downplay or obfuscate anything that would make them seem liable in order to cast themselves in a good light.

He said that, as a result, cruiseliners are likely to attribute the deaths to “natural causes” even if the “totality of the circumstances at hand suggests otherwise.”

That being said, cruiseliners are required to track crimes aboard their ships, according to the Cruise Vessel Security and Safety Act passed in 2010.

How did Michael Virgil die?

Brais noted that alcohol is involved in the majority of the deaths, as was the case with Virgil, who had a blood-alcohol level of 0.182 to 0.186% — or more than twice the legal driving limit — according to an autopsy report obtained by the Daily Mail.

Per the National Library of Medicine, a BAC at or over 0.40% is considered potentially fatal. However, deaths can and do occur at lower levels due to other complications, including aspiration and blocked airways, respiratory arrest and low oxygen, cardiac arrhythmia, combining with prescription drugs, and underlying conditions, such as dehydration and malnourishment, which may make the body more vulnerable to the effects of alcohol.

Virgil had reportedly been served nearly three dozen drinks as part of the Royal Caribbean’s bottomless alcoholic beverages package, according to the wrongful death suit.

However, it’s not clear how many of those drinks he actually consumed.

Then, the intoxicated passenger reportedly went on a rampage after he couldn’t find his room, allegedly attacking and threatening to kill crew members and passengers.

Virgil, who was traveling with Aguilar and their 7-year-old son, was subsequently tackled by crewmembers.

According to the wrongful death suit, they reportedly stood on his body with their full weight, administered an injection of the sedative Haloperidol, and sprayed Virgil with multiple cans of pepper spray.

The passenger was reportedly held down for three minutes before he was cuffed and taken to the ship’s medical center, still breathing, per an autopsy report by the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner’s Office.

Officials noted that while Virgil’s blood-alcohol levels weren’t fatal on their own, they did inhibit his ability to respond to distress during restraint.”

The seafarer’s death was officially attributed to “cardiopulmonary arrest” and “ruled a homicide,” the lawsuit alleges.