When three Panamanian fishermen found themselves at sea without any means of getting their vessel back to port, they were naturally concerned. They were already adrift for at least two weeks when a couple of passengers aboard the Star Princess homed in on them. You would have thought that there would have been a loud noise aboard the Star Princess as it attempted to turn around and save the stranded fishermen, but there was none. Because of the lack of concern by the giant cruise ship, two of the three fishermen (31 year old Elvis Oropeza and 16 year old Fernando Osorio) died, leaving 18 year old Adrian Vasquez, who survived for almost a month to wonder why they were left to die at sea. A lawsuit is presently underway against Princess cruise lines and the two passengers who saw the stranded fishermen through their telescope as they were bird watching are expected to testify. Oregon natives, Jeff Gilligan and Judy Meredith saw the three men, (alive at the time) as one of them waved a red t shirt to get their attention. They immediately notified the ships staff and even went so far as to let the employee see the stranded vessel (through their telescope)  for themselves.

Although the concerned passengers were led to believe that the captain would be notified about the incident, it appears that the information never reached his ears. Despondent that the huge ship made no attempt to turn around and begin a rescue, the three fishermen could only hope that they would at least have sent a message to have them rescued, but that never happened and it was not until another two weeks and the disposal of his deceased friends at sea that Vasquez was eventually rescued. Edward Perrin, skipper of the million dollar vessel claimed that he never knew about the stranded fishermen, making it impossible for him to react accordingly. The concerned passengers decided to take it to the next level and proceeded to send off an email to the US Coast guard with the last known coordinates, unfortunately by that time the smaller vessel had long since drifted away. Vasquez, the only fisherman to survive the ordeal was finally rescued near the Galapagos islandsby the local authorities.