Never before have so many sailors been abandoned at sea

The crew of the Grand Sunny cargo ship has been stuck at sea for a year, unpaid and often hungry, after the vessel’s mysterious owner stopped paying the bills. Crew members of abandoned ships are effectively marooned aboard their vessels because port authorities require them to stay with the ship to ensure the vessels are safe. This means months or even years stuck aboard a vessel thousands of miles away from home until someone picks up the tab for the ship’s maintenance expenses and the sailors’ salaries. As of mid-November, a record 282 ships carrying more than 4,000 seamen had been abandoned by their owners this year, according to the International Transport Workers’ Federation, or ITF, a labor union.