Princess Cruise Lines has agreed to plead guilty and pay a $40 million fine for dumping illegal waste off the coast of England three years ago and trying to cover it up by lying to the U.S. Coast Guard.
The fine is the largest criminal penalty ever paid involving a deliberate dumping by a cruise ship, according to the U.S. Department of Justice, which said such illegal dumping had been committed by the same ship since 2005.
Jan Swartz, president of Princess Cruise Lines, apologized for the dumping and said the Santa Clarita, Calif.-based company had adopted new employee training, environmental procedures and equipment to prevent such incidents in the future.
"We are very sorry for the inexcusable actions of our employees," she said in a video. "We also deeply regret that our oversight was inadequate. We take full responsibility."
The fine and the guilty plea stem from an August 2013 incident when the Caribbean Princess dumped 4,227 gallons of oily waste about 23 miles off the coast of England, according to the Department of Justice. Investigators who reviewed the ship later determined that the crew had used an illegal bypass system, dubbed a magic pipe, to discharge the waste.
Princess is a subsidiary of Carnival Corp., the world's largest cruise company.
