18-year-old, Cameron Robbins, jumps off a cruise ship as a dare and hasn’t been found since.
A haunting new video has emerged that shows the panic and chaos aboard a boat in the Bahamas moments after an 18-year-old Louisiana star high school baseball player jumped off the ship in a dare that turned deadly.
Footage shows Cameron Robbins splashing in the water, with no life jacket on and dressed only in swim trunks, as many of his fellow classmates are in shock and others yell in hysterics.
The group landed in the Bahamas on Wednesday and later went on a pirate-themed sunset cruise with a company called Blackbeard’s Revenge. According to a news release, Royal Bahamas Defence Force personnel contacted Coast Guard District Seven watchstanders on Wednesday at 11:30 p.m. and reported that a man fell off the Blackbeard’s Revenge sunset cruise ship and entered the water.
The ship was near Athol Island an uninhabited island located northeast of Nassau, according to WBRZ. Videos show Robbins jumping from the boat and swimming with a life preserver nearby.
Another said, ‘Oh my f****** god. Oh, shut the f*** up. Oh, bye…bye… Oh … s***!’
‘Grab the buoy.. grab the buoy,’ others yelled out hoping he would hear them.
But video shows Robbins, who was a few feet away from the boat, suddenly drifting in the other direction and away from the buoy, before he disappears into the darkness, witnesses said.
The US Coast Guard and multiple agencies searched the water for days looking for the missing young man. Late Friday, the US Coast Guard officially called off the search, officials said.
Witnesses claimed he was acting on a dare when he jumped overboard at 11.30pm from the Blackbeard’s Revenge sunset cruise ship, according to WAFB.
The ship was near Athol Island, an uninhabited island located northeast of Nassau, when Robbins leaped into the sea.
Robbins had graduated from the University High in Baton Rouge just days prior and was seen wearing his robe and smiling in an Instagram photo taken days before his disappearance.
The star athlete was celebrating his recent graduation from high school with dozens of other seniors from other Baton Rogue High Schools including U-High, Episcopal, Catholic, and St. Joseph’s Academy, a parent told the news outlet.
The students had only arrived on the island hours before the pirate-themed sunset boat excursion and had been staying at the Atlantis Paradise Island in Nassau, the parent said.
After Robbins had jumped, the boat and its crew members tried to locate him along with multiple agencies, including the US Coast Guard. The family of Robbins flew out to the Bahamas on Thursday, WAFB reported.
“The Bahamas government has called off the rescue for Cameron and we are returning to Baton Rouge,” the family said in a statement. “We want to thank the Bahamas government, the US Coast Guard, the United Cajun Navy, and Congressman Garrett Graves for everything they have done for us. In this time of grief, we thank our family, friends, and well-wishers for granting us the privacy we need to properly remember our son and mourn his loss.
