VA - Amy Bradley - missing from cruise ship, Curacao - 1998 #4

[lohrtabitha]

The "she could've swam to shore" argument does feel like a non-starter, IMO. I'm no physicist, but I assume that if you fall over a railing like that, you're pretty likely to hit the water head-first. Given the height of the balcony, I don't think such a fall would leave a person in any condition to be swimming anywhere, to put it lightly.

I have to say, I'm inclined to think that this would be the best-case scenario for what happened in this case, because at least it would have been quick.

One can survive a fall.

‘They found her!’: Witness describes rescue of woman who fell overboard on Royal Caribbean ship

A passenger who went overboard while on a cruise ship was safely rescued. It happened on Sunday aboard Royal Caribbean’s Mariner of the Seas, and people on board say the entire rescue took about 45 minutes.

www.fox35orlando.com

 

[Centaurus]

One can survive a fall.

‘They found her!’: Witness describes rescue of woman who fell overboard on Royal Caribbean ship

A passenger who went overboard while on a cruise ship was safely rescued. It happened on Sunday aboard Royal Caribbean’s Mariner of the Seas, and people on board say the entire rescue took about 45 minutes.

www.fox35orlando.com

In that particular case, ""We did have reports of a person overboard," said the ship’s captain..."

I think survivability depends on a few factors. What deck/level of the ship someone fell from, and the staff being aware someone went overboard to initiate a rescue mission.

 

[TizerisT]

<modsnip: Quoted post was removed>

The pron star he's referring to has no resemblance to Jaz aside from having frizzy hair

 

[RandyMcDonald]

In that particular case, ""We did have reports of a person overboard," said the ship’s captain..."

I think survivability depends on a few factors. What deck/level of the ship someone fell from, and the staff being aware someone went overboard to initiate a rescue mission.

What level of the ship was Amy on?

 

[TizerisT]

8th

 

[RandyMcDonald]

8th

So, if Amy fell perhaps a couple dozen metres, she would probably have suffered injuries not dissimilar to those suffered by jumpers from the Golden Gate Bridge.

Suicides at the Golden Gate Bridge - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

The quote below is from the article.

https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Golden-Gate-Bridge-suicide-lethal-beauty-2562269.php

"The impact is tremendous. The body goes from roughly 75 to 80 mph to nearly zero in a nanosecond. The physics of inertia being what they are, internal organs tend to keep going. The force of impact causes them to tear loose. Autopsy reports typically indicate that the jumpers have lacerated aortas, livers, spleens and hearts. Ribs are often broken, and the impact shoves them into the heart or lungs. Jumpers have broken sternums, clavicles, pelvises and necks. Skull fractures are common.

Which means you die one of two ways, or a combination of both. One, you hit the water and the impact kills you. Sometimes the jumper is knocked unconscious. Other times, the jumper survives for a time. The person can be seen flailing about in the water, trying to stay afloat, only to succumb to the extensive internal bleeding. Death can take seconds or minutes. Two, you drown. You hit the water going fast, and your body plunges in deep. Conscious or otherwise, you breathe in saltwater and asphyxiate."

The article also noted that even in San Francisco's well policed waters, with quick response times, many bodies are never found.

Certainly the odds that Amy, even if she had not been substantially drunk and perhaps sleepy, could have swim after hitting the water are much lower taking the injuries and shock into account.

 

[osu]

Royal Caribbean ‘Vision of the Seas’ is the same ship design as the ‘Rhapsody of the Seas.’ In the past few years there’s been two passengers who have went overboard and were never found.

Vision Of The Seas accidents and incidents | CruiseMapper

Vision Of The Seas cruise ship accidents and incidents reports, Royal Caribbean cruise law news, testimonials.

www.cruisemapper.com

 

[RandyMcDonald]

So, if Amy fell perhaps a couple dozen metres, she would probably have suffered injuries not dissimilar to those suffered by jumpers from the Golden Gate Bridge.

Suicides at the Golden Gate Bridge - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

The quote below is from the article.

https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Golden-Gate-Bridge-suicide-lethal-beauty-2562269.php

"The impact is tremendous. The body goes from roughly 75 to 80 mph to nearly zero in a nanosecond. The physics of inertia being what they are, internal organs tend to keep going. The force of impact causes them to tear loose. Autopsy reports typically indicate that the jumpers have lacerated aortas, livers, spleens and hearts. Ribs are often broken, and the impact shoves them into the heart or lungs. Jumpers have broken sternums, clavicles, pelvises and necks. Skull fractures are common.

Which means you die one of two ways, or a combination of both. One, you hit the water and the impact kills you. Sometimes the jumper is knocked unconscious. Other times, the jumper survives for a time. The person can be seen flailing about in the water, trying to stay afloat, only to succumb to the extensive internal bleeding. Death can take seconds or minutes. Two, you drown. You hit the water going fast, and your body plunges in deep. Conscious or otherwise, you breathe in saltwater and asphyxiate."

The article also noted that even in San Francisco's well policed waters, with quick response times, many bodies are never found.

Certainly the odds that Amy, even if she had not been substantially drunk and perhaps sleepy, could have swim after hitting the water are much lower taking the injuries and shock into account.

Different sources I have come across suggested Amy would have impacted at a slower speed 45 to 50 mph. That is still car-crash speeds, and the sudden deceleration at 10g would be very damaging. Even if Amy was perfectly aware going down, she would still be facing serious injuries.

The SFGate article I linked to goes on at much greater length, and more gruesome length, about the sort of damage the ocean will to do bodies damaged by falls. For instance, bodies will eventually float if they are intact, gas accumulating in body cavities, but if the cavities are torn open the bodies will not be buoyed upwards but simply sink, to be torn apart by decomposition and animals feeding.

 

[TizerisT]

So, if Amy fell perhaps a couple dozen metres, she would probably have suffered injuries not dissimilar to those suffered by jumpers from the Golden Gate Bridge.

I know that in a water plunge, your body shape upon impact is important. If you land in a star shape, you will splat and you may as well be hitting concrete. The preferable way is to make yourself into a sort of pencil shape. You may break your ankles and plunge deeper this way, but the survival chances are better.
I wouldn't fancy her chances anyway though tbh.

 

[RandyMcDonald]

I know that in a water plunge, your body shape upon impact is important. If you land in a star shape, you will splat and you may as well be hitting concrete. The preferable way is to make yourself into a sort of pencil shape. You may break your ankles and plunge deeper this way, but the survival chances are better.
I wouldn't fancy her chances anyway though tbh.

High divers need to be trained in order to avoid inflicting terrible injuries on themselves with each jump.

Couple this with the slow response time—Maybe if the father had somehow been able to segue from hearing the disturbing noise from the balcony to alerting the captain and starting a search immediately, they could have found her. Maybe. Again, even in the narrower and carefully watched waters of the San Francisco Bay and the Golden Gate Bridge, there are bodies that go missing. How much more so in the open ocean?

(That article, incidentally, was from 2005, seven years after Amy's disappearance. I would be very surprised if a cruise ship in 1998 working in a more difficult environment would be able to do better.)

 

[RandyMcDonald]

<modsnip: Quoted post was removed>

One possibility may well be that a random woman has no interest in its being widely known that she acted in adult film, or more.

Especially if she was not working under her own name, as is generally the case, all that it would take for someone to become unrecognizable would be a change in personal style including hair and just waiting for their body to change naturally. Keep a low profile on social media, and you can disappear.

The movie Superman is currently a hit. One thing to keep in mind is that Clark Kent's disguise of glasses actually is a good disguise, legitimately able to confuse people.

The most that I think is possible is that it might become possible to identify which adult star was in the photo. James Renner has apparently had success with one other photographed woman. Identifying the actual person would probably require something like the use of AI.

 

[lohrtabitha]

Brad reported that the balcony door was open which still has me believing Amy left through it. Amy Bradley's Brother Details Their Last Conversation 27 Years After Disappearance

 

[lohrtabitha]

Royal Caribbean ‘Vision of the Seas’ is the same ship design as the ‘Rhapsody of the Seas.’ In the past few years there’s been two passengers who have went overboard and were never found.

Vision Of The Seas accidents and incidents | CruiseMapper

Vision Of The Seas cruise ship accidents and incidents reports, Royal Caribbean cruise law news, testimonials.

www.cruisemapper.com

Right but the documentary said the ship was in the canal and not the open seas as it was preparing to dock. The body should have washed up on the shoreline.

 

[lohrtabitha]

The pron star he's referring to has no resemblance to Jaz aside from having frizzy hair

Without a photo or a website to see the photo how is one able to judge?

 

[TizerisT]

Forgot to mention that how much your body is tensed up also matters a lot. I'm a survivor of a big fall (onto train tracks no less) and remember thinking to myself 'I'm dead' during the fall. I woke up dazed and saw blurred lights in the distance. It was maintenence men and they had turned off the electric on the tracks that night while they do work. I was lucky.
Limped home and went to bed and woke up the next morning head to toe in bruises, so much so that I had to go to the hospital. The doctors told me I was lucky to survive that drop, and because I didn't panic, my body was floppy and I sort of just bounced. If I had been tensed up it would have been far worse they said

 

[RandyMcDonald]

Right but the documentary said the ship was in the canal and not the open seas as it was preparing to dock. The body should have washed up on the shoreline.

Why? What currents were in play there?

Beyond that, keep in mind that with after it is not only a matter of searching two dimensions, the surface area, but it is a matter of searching three dimensions, volume. That greatly multiplies the amount of space that would need to be searched, even if we made the assumption that Amy's body remained intact.

Throw in the issue of currents, which could easily move even an intact body out of a search area, and you have a huge issue for searchers.

 

[adot0902]

DBM

 

[lohrtabitha]

Why? What currents were in play there?

Beyond that, keep in mind that with after it is not only a matter of searching two dimensions, the surface area, but it is a matter of searching three dimensions, volume. That greatly multiplies the amount of space that would need to be searched, even if we made the assumption that Amy's body remained intact.

Throw in the issue of currents, which could easily move even an intact body out of a search area, and you have a huge issue for searchers.

"The Marines, the Venezuelan Coast Guard, the Navy, everybody was looking in that area. Because of the position of the boat, wind force, sea current and the wave height, the body would have washed up. But she was nowhere to be found," Henry Vrutaal, a member of the Curaçao coast guard, recalled in Amy Bradley Is Missing."
From the documentary

 

[RandyMcDonald]

"The Marines, the Venezuelan Coast Guard, the Navy, everybody was looking in that area. Because of the position of the boat, wind force, sea current and the wave height, the body would have washed up. But she was nowhere to be found," Henry Vrutaal, a member of the Curaçao coast guard, recalled in Amy Bradley Is Missing."
From the documentary

I am skeptical of the claims of the effectiveness of the search. Steven O'Brien in 1993 probably fell in the much more restricted waters of Charlottetown on PEI and was never found.

Missing Children Database: Steven O'Brien

MissingKids.ca – Missing Children Database: Steven O'Brien

missingkids.ca

In 1995, meanwhile, six teenage boys stole a boat from Pickering Harbour on Lake Ontario and took it out into the lake. All search teams found was a gas can probably belonging to the boat, nothing else of the boat, and nothing of the boys.

March 17 marks 29 years since the ‘Lost Boys of Pickering’ disappeared

Next year will mark three decades since the friends were last seen near the Lake Ontario shore in Pickering.

www.toronto.com

I think it makes perfect sense to be suspicious of the claim that they would have found Amy's body in the ocean. What if the body was not intact, or what if it was not floating?

 

[lohrtabitha]

I am skeptical of the claims of the effectiveness of the search. Steven O'Brien in 1993 probably fell in the much more restricted waters of Charlottetown on PEI and was never found.

Missing Children Database: Steven O'Brien

MissingKids.ca – Missing Children Database: Steven O'Brien

missingkids.ca

In 1995, meanwhile, six teenage boys stole a boat from Pickering Harbour on Lake Ontario and took it out into the lake. All search teams found was a gas can probably belonging to the boat, nothing else of the boat, and nothing of the boys.

March 17 marks 29 years since the ‘Lost Boys of Pickering’ disappeared

Next year will mark three decades since the friends were last seen near the Lake Ontario shore in Pickering.

www.toronto.com

I think it makes perfect sense to be suspicious of the claim that they would have found Amy's body in the ocean. What if the body was not intact, or what if it was not floating?

I am going to side with the Navy and Coastguard who are experts in their field. Anything else is just speculation.