A river cruise ship carrying 200+ people temporarily ran aground on the Danube River near the village of Garla Mare (Mehedinti County, Romania), close to the point where the borders of Romania, Bulgaria, and Serbia converge.
The incident occurred amid unusually low water levels, according to reports from Digi 24 TV.
Based on CruiseMapper's satellite AIS tracking, there is a possibility, the vessel was longship Viking Lif (tracker).
The ship had been sailing from Turnu Magurele toward Vienna with 180 passengers and 53 crew members when it became stranded on a sandbank. At the time, the river’s flow in the Garla Mare region had fallen to approximately 2,600 m3 per second—well below the seasonal norm of around 3,800 cubic meters—reducing navigable depth and exposing sandbars along the channel.
Local authorities responded promptly, maintaining communication with the vessel’s crew and ensuring that passengers had adequate supplies as the situation developed. Given the uncertain duration of the grounding, provisions were delivered to sustain those aboard for several days if required.
Conditions improved the following morning as the river’s flow increased, allowing the vessel to refloat and resume its upstream voyage toward Austria. No injuries or significant damage were reported, and navigation on that section of the Danube has since returned to normal parameters.