At least 41 passengers and crew on a Norwegian cruise ship have tested positive for Covid-19, officials say.

Hundreds more passengers who travelled on the MS Roald Amundsen are in quarantine and awaiting test results, the company that owns the ship said. The ship, which belongs to the Norwegian firm Hurtigruten, docked in the port of Tromso in northern Norway on Friday. Hurtigruten has halted all leisure cruises because of the outbreak.

“This is a serious situation for everyone involved. We have not been good enough and we have made mistakes,” Chief Executive Daniel Skjeldamsaid in a statement on Monday. “A preliminary evaluation shows a breakdown in several of our internal procedures,” he added. “The only responsible choice is to suspend all expedition sailings.” 

Norway’s government has announced it will stop all cruise ships with more than 100 people on board from disembarking passengers for at least 14 days. And police said they were investigating whether any laws had been broken prior to the outbreak on the Roald Amundsen. “We have found grounds to open a case,” a police official told Reuters news agency.(BBC)…[+]

A woman has suffered serious injuries after being struck and injured while swimming with humpback whales off the coast of Western Australia. The Australian woman, 29, was with a tour group at the popular Ningaloo Reef on Saturday when she was struck. She reportedly suffered fractured ribs and internal bleeding. St John Ambulance said the woman had suffered internal bleeding and upper torso injuries “from  the crush”. Unconfirmed reports said she was trapped between two of the giant mammals, which can grow up to 19m (62ft). She was treated in the town of Exmouth before being flown to a hospital in Perth, where she was in a “serious but stable condition” on Monday. 

Other guests on the snorkelling tour witnessed the incident but were uninjured, according to Western Australia Police. The tour group had only been a few hundred metres from the shore when the incident happened. Police said work safety regulators were investigating the incident, as it had involved a charter group.

Chartered swimming with humpback whales is currently undergoing a five-year trial in the region, monitored by the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions (DBCA). Fifteen tour operators have been licensed to take groups of nine swimming with the whales, with guidance in place advising the swimmers to stay at least 15m from the animals. The DBCA said in a statement it was “working closely with the industry and the tour operator involved to understand how the incident occurred”, and that swimming with humpback whales involved “some inherent risk”.

It said nearly 10,000 participants had swum with humpback whales since the trial began in 2016, with no previous incidents resulting in serious injuries.(BBC)…[+]