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A royal screwup.
A mother from North Carolina drove a long distance to surprise her family with a cruise. However, her plans took a sour turn when her special needs teenage son was denied boarding at a Florida port due to a mistake made by the cruise company.
Shannon Nutting had been eagerly planning this dream vacation for over a year. She had arranged a Royal Caribbean cruise for herself and her four children, but the excitement quickly turned into a heartbreaking ordeal even before they could embark on the trip.
“Everybody was just heartbroken and devastated,” she told ABC 11 last Friday.
Living in Pembroke, North Carolina, Shannon had meticulously organized the trip since November 2023. She had taken time off from her job as a teacher and had even brought a babysitter along to help with the kids during the cruise.
When the cruise ship pulled into Port Canaveral, Nutting finally told her kids they were about to go on a voyage vacation.
“My 9-year-old was so excited, she was speechless and started crying,” she told the station.
But a sinking feeling quickly engulfed the family.
Staffers, including a supervisor, told Nutting her 16-year-old son could not board because he only had a student identification even though she checked ahead of time to make sure that document was acceptable.
“I explained to her that my son has special needs, that’s one of the reasons why he did not yet have a state-issued ID and that I called to make sure he could board without it,” she told the local outlet. “She said she didn’t care what he had.”
The disheartened mom and her kids did not make it onto the ship for their dream vacation as a result.
Eventually, Nutting’s travel agent reached a Royal Caribbean rep who said the family should have all been allowed on the ship. The cruise line said they could fly to Cozumel, Mexico to meet the ship two days into the trip, but on their own dime, ABC 11 reported.
She turned that down and the family ended up staying in Florida for a few days to salvage some of their time off.
Royal Caribbean told the station that human error by the staff at the port was behind the family’s devastating rejection.
The company offered a trio of options to make up for the mistake, including a full refund for the cruise, but none of the choices would provide the family with the money they spent in order to reach the port, which Nutting found “unacceptable.”
“If I made the mistake and they offered me anything, any kind of refund, then I would think that would be gracious of them. But I didn’t make any mistakes,” Nutting told the station.
“I made sure we had our documentation. Everybody’s birth certificates were certified. The people who needed IDs had IDs, and I just feel like them offering a refund of the cruise price is just unacceptable.”
Royal Caribbean did not immediately respond to a Post inquiry.