Carnival's Whittier labor dispute resolved

The odd Whittier, Alaska, luggage-moving labor dispute pitting Carnival Spirit vs. the longshoremen has been resolved, yet the resolution doesn't really clear up the nature of the original dispute.

Here's the thing. In US ports, longshoremen are responsible for moving luggage on the pier, and the cruise line's onboard employees, usually foreigners, move the luggage within the ship. And other Carnival Corporation lines have been coming and going from Whittier with no hubbub. No labor dispute of this type has erupted anywhere in recent memory, so the rules seem pretty well agreeable to both sides.

So what happened in Whittier? The best we can guess from published reports, since Carnival isn't really shedding a lot of light, is that a dispute arose over who actually would make the penultimate move between pier and ship (and vice versa). Was Carnival trying to prevent the longshoremen from setting foot on the vessel? Or were the union members unusually insistent about coming onboard? Who knows.

Anyway, given that Carnival remains mum other than to say that the issue is resolved, the union is claiming victory since they are now making the move of the baggage onto the vessel. We're just happy that the risk of passenger inconvenience has been eliminated.

KTUU-TV (Anchorage): Longshoremen claim victory in fight with cruise line