to the mouth of the Saguenay, at about 11:30 local time, whales were observed in the St. Lawrence River. To prolong the whale-watching activity, the vessel was turned around but ran aground on the Bancs de l'île Rouge (Rouge Island Banks) before completing its maneuver. The vessel's stern made bottom contact with the shoal. The vessel slowed and the stern came to rest on the Bancs de l'île Rouge. At 12:06, the vessel was aground, listing 5.2º to port. As the vessel was unstable on the reef, the master requested assistance from the Canadian Coast Guard for a preventive evacuation of all passengers plus some crew members. The Marine Rescue Centre of Québec tasked different resources including whale-watching tour boats and the two provincial ferries normally crossing the Saguenay River. However, at the very last moment, with the assistance of a small Search and Rescue cutter and the high tide, Norwegian Sky was able to free herself from the reef and proceeded to deeper waters. The vessel sustained substantial damage, but pollution was deemed minor. No injuries resulted from this occurrence. The vessel returned to Québec City for major repairs in a local dry-dock taking over a month. As a result, three cruises had to be cancelled. In May 2001, the autopilot on Norwegian Sky failed and caused it to make a jarring turn and then list, sending plates and glasses crashing and injuring more than 78 people. The malfunction, near the mouth of the Strait of Juan de Fuca, appeared to be the result of a computer error. Two serious injuries were the result of a video game machine falling on one passenger and another passenger suffering a broken pelvis when he was washed out of a pool due to the severe list. After the fish tender Arctic Sun struck a rock and sank in Clarence Strait in the Alexander Archipelago in Southeast Alaska on July 26, 2002, and the three people on board abandoned ship in a skiff, Norwegian Sky rescued them from the skiff and transported them to Ketchikan, Alaska. On Saturday, April 18, 2009, at 3:30 AM, a 39-year-old man went overboard in the Bahamas. A search party consisting of three cruise ships and two U.S. Coast Guard helicopters searched for the man for twelve hours before calling off the search. It is unclear whether the man committed suicide. On December 4, 2015, the ship had