No, it’s not a return to the old way of doing things, despite what some people may have heard.
Anyone that’s taken a cruise before knows you always have one piece of “homework” to complete before you are officially on vacation: the muster drill. This drill directs you where to go and what to do in the case of an emergency on the ship.
Muster used to be a bit of an ordeal. Prior to the pandemic, passengers would all have to group together at their muster station (typically an assigned spot on the ship’s deck) and listen to a safety briefing.
The muster drill would take upwards of 30 minutes or more as it takes a while for passengers to all stop what they are doing and find their muster stations. Then they’d have to listen to a lengthy talk about what to do in an emergency. In addition, everything around the entire ship shut down — such as bar service — while the drill was underway.
That all changed with the pandemic.
To help keep people from having to congregate so close together when there were worries about illness, cruise lines switched to “e-muster.” Now, passengers across cruise lines typically watch a safety video on their phone and then simply check in on their own time at the muster station.
E-muster is immensely popular among passengers. It’s faster, less disruptive to the cruise life onboard, and you don’t have to stand crowded shoulder to shoulder with hundreds of other people.
That is why when a rumor started to spread that Carnival Cruise Line was reverting back to the old way of doing the muster drill, it caused some panic online.
We’re not sure where the story began, but we did notice a thread on a CruiseCritic message board where a user posted a letter they received from Carnival for a March 2nd sailing aboard Carnival Magic.
In that letter, Carnival wrote that its safety drills “will mostly follow a self-mustering format, but, occasionally the team will conduct a full safety drill on random sailings.” The letter went on to say that the specific sailing would see a full safety drill.
A few weeks later, another poster said they received the same email for their upcoming sailing.
Emails like this could have caught people’s attention and led them to believe that Carnival was going back exclusively to the old way of muster.
However, we can say that is definitely not the case.
In a short video about the topic, Carnival Brand Ambassador John Heald set the record straight for anyone that may have gotten the wrong impression:
“Lots of people who write these cruise news sites, YouTube, Tik-Toking and all that, have given some wrong information,” said Heald.
“Are we returning to the old way of doing the lifeboat drill — muster station — whatever you like to call it? The answer is no.”
Heald continued, “Once approximately every six months, we will, on every ship, do a full muster. We’re required to do this within regulations from the U.S. Coast Guard and our own internal orders as well.”
“So for those people saying we’re doing this every week, please ignore it,” he said.
Bottom line: No, Carnival isn’t going back to the old way of doing muster drills, but it is possible your specific cruise could require it based on the schedule. If so, you can expect a message from Carnival before the trip to let you know.
For more on muster drills, you can read our article here.
