TV star vanishes from cruise ship
A massive search is underway for a German TV star and singer who has gone missing while on a cruise to Canada.
The cruise operator, Aida Cruises, said there was reason to believe Daniel Kueblboeck may have jumped into the sea on Sunday morning.
“That is our suspicion,” spokesman Hansjoerg Kunze said.
Kueblboeck first entered stardom after appearing on Germany’s version of Pop Idol in 2003.
However, the star’s disappearance follows a recent post the 33-year-old wrote about being bullied.
Kueblboeck revealed on his official fan club page that he had suffered “months of bullying” as a child at school, that shook him “deeply”.
“Dear fans. Unfortunately, I still do not feel better mentally and physically,” he wrote.
“I have yet to cope with this pain of the past months.”
Kueblboeck, who auditioned but was not selected as Germany’s Eurovision entry in 2014, was travelling to Newfoundland, Canada, with 2200 passengers.
When Kueblboeck was found to be missing, Aida said the ship was stopped and returned to the spot off the coast of Newfoundland where it is believed he went overboard.
The incident occurred 185km north of the city of St John’s, Newfoundland.
The Canadian coastguard confirmed on Sunday that it was using a surveillance plane and helicopter to search the Labrador Sea for Kueblboeck.
Two other cruise ships also reportedly assisted with the search.
Kueblboeck, who was born in Bavaria, made his last major TV appearance in the eighth season of Let’s Dance in 2015 and was studying to be an actor at the European Theatre Institute Berlin.
Kueblboeck's cruise ship disappearance comes months after an Australian woman died after she fell from an upper-level deck of the Pacific Dawn into the ocean off the coast of New Caledonia.
Last month, a British cruise passenger was rescued after surviving 10 hours floating in the Adriatic Sea off Croatia.
The 46-year-old claimed that she fell over the balcony, but passengers have since claimed that she jumped after a drunken argument with her boyfriend.