When I saw the mess on Carnival cruise ship Triumph, my first reaction was why did those people have to suffer for so long and why could not the cruise line simply send another similar cruise ship and transfer all the passengers. If the company was not doing it, there must have been a reason for it. Well, I did find out. While I have never been on a cruise and probably never will (the idea of being on a boat does not appeal to it because I would rather explore new places on land during a vacation than lounge all day and eat like a pig) but these ships are huge and can sometimes have as many crew members as passengers. So it is not uncommon to have a few thousand passengers and as many employees making the total number of people on the ship around 8,000.
The only way to transfer people from one ship to another on high seas will be to transfer them on life boats (for safety reasons the two ships cannot get very close to each other) and that is just impractical for thousands of passengers. Not only it is going to be cumbersome the waves on high seas are so strong and high that it is not a pleasant trip for anyone, and definitely not for children and seniors (there will be a lot of injured people). So while it was inconvenient, no passengers were hurt or died. Indeed, in an emergency, for instance, if the ship were burning, lifeboats will be used and people will be transferred to other vessels, and they might be able to get away with deaths and injuries (dozens of people died during the Costa Concordia disaster).
The only way to transfer people from one ship to another on high seas will be to transfer them on life boats (for safety reasons the two ships cannot get very close to each other) and that is just impractical for thousands of passengers. Not only it is going to be cumbersome the waves on high seas are so strong and high that it is not a pleasant trip for anyone, and definitely not for children and seniors (there will be a lot of injured people). So while it was inconvenient, no passengers were hurt or died. Indeed, in an emergency, for instance, if the ship were burning, lifeboats will be used and people will be transferred to other vessels, and they might be able to get away with deaths and injuries (dozens of people died during the Costa Concordia disaster).