Carnival Conquest/Freedom problems at Grand Cayman today?

Was watching AIS marine traffic and the parade of ships heading into the Grand Cayman Island this morning along the south side of the island. All of a sudden several stopped on the sheltered south side and spent some time hovering around, only the Freedom of the Seas looks to have gotten the closest to Georgetown anchorage, then turned west and accelerated to 14 knots away from the island.

Anyone hear about weather issues today in the Cayman's?

I put an 'X' on the map below where they normally anchor, as you can see the ships are no where near that. I also see that the Carnival Freedom is a Storm Deviation from Ocho Rios to Grand Cayman. Did she swap her itinerary around? Can't be fun for those folks!

Looks like they may be using an alternate anchorage site? Never seen them use that before.

They're reporting seas 5 to 8 feet around the Cayman Islands... if it's like that over the reef they can't tender.

It may well be calmer on the south side of the island...

:)

They're reporting seas 5 to 8 feet around the Cayman Islands... if it's like that over the reef they can't tender.

It may well be calmer on the south side of the island...

:)

I'm guessing the sheltered south side can't take a lot of ships, maybe why the Freedom of the Seas gave up and headed west to sea.

Here you can see some of the swells washing up over the pier and the wind swept wave cap in one picture:

Here are two screen grabs comparing the two piers, the first is the main pier for the primary anchorage on the west side of the island, the second is the pier at the alternate anchorage on the sheltered south side. The scale of each image is identical:

It appears by IAS marine traffic that both the Carnival Freedom and Carnival Conquest (both steaming away at 15+ knots) have now abandoned their attempts to use the alternate anchorage and pier on the sheltered south side of Grand Cayman and are heading to sea.

The alternate is Spotts, but maybe it is too rough there, also. Sometimes ships use both.

With waves like that, all water based excursions would likely be canceled.

Carnival Freedom sailing away from Grand Cayman

It's possible the port authority closed all ports. 3yrs ago we missed grand cayman bc the port authority closed all ports due rough waters.

Yuck.. No fun.. Great images and map locations. Thanks everyone!

Relatives of mine on the Inspiration told me Monday that their call on Grand Cayman for today was cancelled before they even left Tampa due to high seas.

I have missed Grand Cayman on both of my 7 seven cruises. I'm not surprised.