The news has been full of stories about passengers disappearing from cruise ships.  Think back to the case of George Smith IV, who vanished from his honeymoon cruise in July 2005. In fact, this case and others like it have drawn so much attention that the House of Representatives has scheduled hearings to examine the topic of cruise ship safety and Congress is trying to draft legislation on cruise ship crime prevention.

In the Smith case, the media was quick to jump on the culpability of the cruise line, with initial reports that Smith’s wife was taken off the ship in Turkey, where the ship had been en route, alone and without money or belongings. According to the cruise line, however, the ship’s crew performed an intensive search, cooperated with the FBI and the Turkish investigation at every step, and accompanied Smith’s wife during her police questioning in Turkey. (The case has since been settled out of court.)

Nor is Smith’s disappearance completely unique. Other unexplained disappearances are beginning to surface, including – most recently – the story of a 15-year-old girl who is believed to have fallen or jumped overboard while on a seven-day Western Caribbean cruise.

The publicity surrounding these cases, while undeniably a good thing if it encourages both cruise lines and passengers to examine the issue, may raise fears among potential passengers that are out of proportion with the reality.

To put it into perspective, according to the International Council of Cruise Lines, just over a dozen people have been reported missing from cruise ships in the last two years – a time during which a whopping 20 million people cruised. While there may be no telling how many of those are accidental cases of people falling overboard, it seems likely that most are.

Why? To put it simply, alcohol. A frequent cruiser myself, I’ve been on ships where passengers are staggering around holding buckets of beer or oversized tropical cocktails before the ship has even left the dock. And while parents are typically protective of their young children on cruise ships, parents of older kids sometimes rely on the ship’s crew to enforce drinking laws that may be different than the age restrictions you have at home. Even adults who wouldn’t think of drinking round the clock at home may slip into a partying-vacation mode attitude while cruising.

Of course, falling overboard isn’t the only risk passengers run by drinking too much; a state of inebriation also makes them vulnerable to crime. For while crime is relative low on cruise ships – and new safety measures, such as security cameras, should help reduce the incidences of crime even more – keep in mind that some ships now hold as many as 4,500 passengers and crew. Of those, there are going to be some bad apples.

Our advice? For starters, it's always better to be safe than sorry and travel insurance is a sure way to give yourself some peace of mind, at the very least. At best, it can cover you if the unthinkable happens or if you just have a few too many cocktails and sprain your ankle stumbling back to your cabin. Avoid the cruise line coverage and choose a third party insurer instead. Should you need it, you'll get more reliable coverage for your money.

Hit the high seas with your kids but, as you would at any land-based resort, set some ground rules, consider keeping tabs on your children with walky-talkies, model responsible behavior and don’t suspend all common sense at embarkation.