The captain of the Zenith yesterday slammed accusations that he had acted "incompetently'' when he set sail from New York over a week ago.

Capt. Ioannis Papanikolau told The Royal Gazette that his decision to set sail for Bermuda in the face of a stampeding Hurricane Edouard was the correct one.

And he stated that if a similar situation were to ever arise again he would sail.

"It was 100 percent the right decision,'' he said.

The captain stressed that he would never have put passengers' lives or the ship at risk and added that his own family, including his nine and 11-year-old sons were also on board.

He said the whole story had resulted from 50 seconds of severe rolling the ship had experienced upon entering the Gulf Stream on its way down and added that newspapers had received false information.

This had come from a few disgruntled passengers while the majority had been happy with the voyage while being relieved to have made it through the hurricane.

Capt. Papanikolau said when he made the decision to sail, the hurricane was 530 miles away from New York and weather reports from the National Hurricane Center in Miami were saying the hurricane would turn toward the US mainland.

The centre was also predicting that the hurricane would come ashore in the region of New Jersey and Long Island, which was very close to New York Harbour where the ship was berthed.

If he had stayed in port, he continued, he would have put the ship, crew and passengers at greater risk but there was no need to with the hurricane turning inland.

And standard procedure for all vessels was to clear out of port when a severe storm approached, he said.

Seventeen other ships sailed from the area at approximately the same time including Bermuda visitors Dreamward and Bermuda Islander .

The weather was beautiful at sea for the first day and night as the ship headed east to avoid the storm, he continued, but then the hurricane straightened and headed north catching the ship in its fringe.

The captain said he had no choice but to continue through and was relieved to arrive in Bermuda without serious injuries to his passengers or serious damage to his ship.

He said the dents the ship received on its bow were purely cosmetic and did not effect its sea worthiness.

Meyer Agencies Ltd. president Henry Hayward said Capt. Papanikolau had held the rank for ten years "so he should know what he's doing''. The captain had close to 35 years experience at sea, he continued.

Capt. Papanikolau said he did not appreciate what certain passengers had said about the voyage after all he and his crew had done to please them.

Captain defends decision to sail He had been around every day throughout the voyage, even inviting passengers to the bridge so he could explain what had happened and show them weather reports.

After the brief period of severe rolling, he continued, he had immediately addressed the ship, explaining what had happened.

And he stressed that he arrived in port with the majority of his passengers feeling very happy and had since received many positive letters from passengers on the voyage praising him and the crew.

He read out some of the letters he had received thanking him and his crew for the excellent job they had done and promising to see him again when they sailed with him on the next occasion.

He praised his crew for the work they had done helping passengers and said US newspaper reports quoted supposed crew members who were never on board the ship.

"I don't know who these people are but they were never on board this ship.'' These false reports made him upset, he said, because they were not fair to him or his crew.