What Does Code Alpha Mean On A Cruise Ship?

If you've ever been on a cruise ship, you know how big they are. They're so big, in fact, that three of them were included on our list of ten of the biggest ships the world has ever seen. As you can probably imagine, it takes a lot of people to keep one of these huge vessels going. Communication is an important part of any job, and when you have hundreds, sometimes thousands, of crewmembers to communicate with, you need to do it efficiently, especially when something unexpected happens. After all, on a cruise ship, it's just not feasible to send a message to a group chat and hope everyone sees it when time is of the essence, which is often the case in emergency situations.

On a cruise ship, a lot of communication takes place over the public address system. That way, everyone who needs to know about ship operations, including passengers, is aware of important updates. As a passenger, you won't be privy to the details of every onboard communication — because you simply may not understand what's being said. Sometimes, listening to the crew communicate can feel like eavesdropping on people speaking another language, and that's often by design. Staff on cruise ships use coded language to avoid unnecessarily disturbing passengers. One of the most common codes is "Alpha," which is typically used to discreetly let staff know that there's a medical emergency on board. 

In the same way that bikers have special ways of communicating with each other, like pointing two fingers down when out on the road, staff on cruise ships have their own secret language.The next time you're on a cruise ship and hear "Alpha" or "Alpha, Alpha, Alpha" in quick succession, most of the time you can assume a passenger is experiencing a medical emergency. However, there's no international standard, so cruise lines are free to assign their own meaning to Code Alpha if it better serves them. That's why on some cruise ships like Royal Caribbean, Code Alpha may signal a general emergency, while on Carnival Cruise Line, "Alpha Team" is reportedly used for a fire emergency.

The purpose of using Code Alpha instead of directly announcing a medical emergency is to maintain calm while communicating clearly to those who need to respond. Given cruise ships are sometimes bigger than aircraft carriers, you're unlikely to ever know what the medical emergency was, but the ship's medical crew know they must attend to the situation immediately, and there's no time to waste.

You might hear Code Alpha announced along with a location so that the crew can quickly locate and assist the person in need while minimizing disruption to other passengers. When you hear Code Alpha on your next cruise, there's no need to do anything — just follow crew member instructions and give them plenty of room to manage the situation.