By JOHN McCARTHY / V.I. Free Press News Reporter
FREDERIKSTED — The Virgin Islands Free Press is issuing an urgent public safety warning to the thousands of passengers and crew members arriving tomorrow aboard Royal Caribbean’s Rhapsody of the Seas, following the discovery of an unmitigated structural hazard directly along the town’s primary tourist walking route.
The Rhapsody of the Seas is scheduled to tie up at the Frederiksted Cruise Ship Dock at 8:00 AM on Thursday, June 25. Upon disembarking, visitors traveling toward downtown Frederiksted Town or accessing local financial services will be channeled directly past a structurally compromised wooden canopy outside the First Bank location on Strand Street—just a mere 100 yards from the cruise ship dock and 25 feet from the Frederiksted Waterfront Promenade.
Exclusive dual-angle investigative photography obtained by the Virgin Islands Free Press reveals that a major vehicular impact earlier this week completely pulverized the concrete base anchor and sheared a primary timber support column from its foundation brackets. The heavy overhead walkway is currently dangling in mid-air, entirely un-shored, and structurally unstable.
Beyond the catastrophic danger of a physical canopy collapse onto pedestrian heads, the shattered pillar presents acute environmental health risks, including jagged, heavily oxidized steel brackets capable of causing deep lacerations and severe tetanus infections to anyone brushing past the tight sidewalk corridor.
THE TOURIST CHOKEPOINT: The danger zone is not a remote storefront; it sits directly on Strand Street, the primary logistical hub where local taxi vans assemble to load thousands of disembarking cruise ship passengers for island tours. By leaving the compromised canopy dangling, local authorities are forcing international visitors and local drivers to stage, wait, and load within feet of a pulverized structural foundation. The economic and physical threat sits just across Market Street from local fixtures like Polly’s at the Pier, making it an unavoidable bottleneck for early-morning commerce and international foot traffic.
Despite forty-eight hours of advanced notice, the Virgin Islands Police Department (VIPD) has completely stonewalled independent news media and failed to notify cruise line operators or international passengers of the active hazard. Instead of deploying emergency public works crews to secure the vertical load, local authorities have merely draped the structural failure in yellow plastic “CRIME SCENE” tape—a measure that offers zero structural protection against the laws of gravity or sudden tropical wind gusts.
The Virgin Islands Free Press has taken proactive measures tonight to alert port operations and corporate safety managers at Royal Caribbean International regarding the unmanaged liability awaiting their passengers at the gateway to St. Croix.
Arriving tourists and local residents are strongly advised to completely bypass the sidewalk awning outside First Bank and exercise extreme vigilance when navigating the intersection of Market Street and Strand Street tomorrow. When local law enforcement refuses to report for duty, the community and its visitors must look out for themselves.
