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Man jumps from 11th floor of world's largest cruise ship in Instagram stunt

He jumped 30 metres into the sea in the Bahamas

Cathy Adams
Friday 18 January 2019 06:22 EST
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Nick Naydev jumped from Royal Caribbean's Symphony of the Seas
Nick Naydev jumped from Royal Caribbean's Symphony of the Seas (Nick Naydev/Instagram)

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A passenger jumped from the 11th floor of the world’s largest cruise ship in an attempt to go viral on Instagram.

American Nick Naydev, 27, jumped 30 metres from the 1,120-foot-long Royal Caribbean ship while friends filmed the stunt.

The Symphony of the Seas ship was docked in Nassau, Bahamas, at the time.

The video has since been watched more than 150,000 times on Instagram, with commentators labelling Naydev "stupid" and "crazy". One user even called him “Colin from Bandersnatch”, in a nod to the Netflix episode of Black Mirror where a character jumps from a balcony.

“I was still drunk from the previous night,” Naydev wrote in the comments under the video. “When I woke up I just decided to jump.”

When asked if he realised if he could’ve died, Naydev responded: “Honestly didn’t really think about it.”

He also admitted he was in a lot of pain.

“When I sobered up my back started hurting pretty bad. Could barely walk for three days.”

Naydev was picked up by a small boat and taken back to the ship, where he then said that he was “kicked off” and had to get a flight back to Miami.

In a statement, Royal Caribbean called the stunt “stupid and reckless”, and that “he and his companions have been banned from ever sailing with us again”. The cruise line added: “We are exploring legal action.”

The Symphony of the Seas is the largest passenger ship in the world, weighing more than 220,000 tonnes across 18 decks. The ship can accommodate almost 7,000 passengers as well as 2,200 crew members.

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