Charleston, Mar 18 (THAINDIAN NEWS) A SC cruise liner – ‘The Celebrity Mercury’ had to return early, as it was hit by an outbreak of intestinal illness. Following the outbreak of the illness, the operator Celebrity Cruises hired some extra crew, so that they could scrub and clean the infected ship.

The cruise liner came back to Charleston, much before the expected date of arrival, at around 2 am on Thursday. The ship had left the port on the 8th of March, and it had to return early, as out of the 1800 passengers on board, around 369 of them became ill.

Prior to this outbreak of the intestinal illness, 2 other cruises were also affected and this became the third cruise in a row to be affected by the norovirus. It is quite contagious and closed quarters aids its progress amongst potential victims. Its symptoms include nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and stomach cramps.

The investigations are on, into the causes and the reasons behind the outbreak, and the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention said that they would investigate the matter in a proper manner.

“Yes, yes we were, but it wasn’t going to keep us from going. This was our first cruise so we were going to go and it didn’t discourage us from doing it again” according to Linda McNeil who had also fallen sick on the cruise.