In 1998, She Vanished Without A Trace While On A Cruise With Her Family, And They Suspect She May Have Been Abducted
Amy Lynn Bradley was born in Petersburg, Virginia, on May 12, 1974, and was a resident of Chesterfield County, Virginia.
She went on to attend college at Longwood, Virginia, on a basketball scholarship. Then, she graduated with a degree in physical education and was looking forward to starting a new job at a computer consulting firm before her tragic disappearance during a family vacation in 1998.
On March 21, 1998, 23-year-old Amy joined her parents and brother on the Rhapsody of the Seas, the Royal Caribbean International Cruise Line’s ship. That day, the ship left San Juan, Puerto Rico, for Aruba. Two days later, on March 23, the ship departed from Aruba and headed to Curacao.
According to the FBI, Amy went missing in the early morning hours of March 24 while the ship was traveling between the two destinations. The night before she vanished, Amy’s brother, Brad, who was then 21-years-old, told authorities that he and Amy went to a party on the ship.
They were dancing and drinking with Blue Orchid, the ship’s orchestra. One of the band members, Alister Douglas, otherwise known as Yellow, reported that he and Amy parted ways at 1:00 a.m.
The computerized door lock system on the ship showed that Brad returned to their family’s private suite at 3:35 a.m. Five minutes later, Amy arrived. Brad said the two of them chatted on the suite’s balcony before he went to sleep. When he left to go to bed, Amy was seated on a lounge chair on the balcony.
The next morning, Amy’s loved ones awoke to find her gone. Between 5:15 and 5:30 a.m., Amy’s father, Ron, woke up and saw Amy still resting on the lounge chair. But when he checked on her again at 6:00 a.m., she was no longer there. Her cigarettes and lighter were gone as well.
Brad believed that Amy had possibly mentioned leaving the ship when it reached Curacao to buy some cigarettes. The sliding glass door that led to the balcony had been left partially open, and a pair of Amy’s sandals were found inside her suite. Her ID was still in the room, along with the nine other pairs of shoes she bought on the cruise.
Two passengers on the cruise claimed they saw a woman riding the elevator to the top deck of the ship at 6:00 a.m. However, the sighting was not confirmed to be Amy.
FBI – pictured above is Amy
Amy’s family realized she was missing between approximately 6:00 and 6:30 a.m. They immediately reported it to the crew. At the time, the ship was preparing to dock in Curacao’s port.
“When we discovered Amy was missing, we begged the ship’s personnel to not put the gangway down, to not allow anybody to leave the ship. And we told them that if Amy had left the room for any more than 15 minutes, she would have left us a note. And they put the gangway down anyway. People left the ship in Curacao,” Iva Bradley, Amy’s mother, told NBC News in 2005.
In total, there were 2,000 passengers on the ship. The crew did not begin searching for Amy right away because they were preparing for their arrival in Curacao. Later, officials conducted extensive searches on the ship and at sea. The Netherlands Antilles Coast Guard spent four days looking for Amy. Their search ended on March 27.
Brad was the last person to see Amy alive. In a video shared by the FBI, he said, “Myself and my parents have had to endure a lot of sadness, but the last thing that I ever said to Amy was, ‘I love you,’ before I went to sleep that night. Knowing that’s the last thing I said to her has always been very comforting to me.”
At first, authorities suspected that Amy had fallen overboard, was pushed, or had taken her own life. But this seemed unlikely since Amy was a strong swimmer and a trained lifeguard. Her body was never found in the water. Plus, the ship had been close to shore, so if she had fallen into the water, there would’ve been multiple witnesses to observe the incident.
Another reported sighting of a woman matching Amy’s description was from a cab driver who stated that a woman approached him, urgently asking to use a phone. The sighting remained unconfirmed.
Amy’s family members believe she was forced to leave the ship and was abducted by a person she befriended on the cruise. At the time of her disappearance, rumors of a maritime pirate operation in Curacao had been circulating, so Amy may have been abducted as part of a human trafficking scheme.
Amy’s loved ones claim that she had no reason to run away. She had a new job and home back in Virginia and would never voluntarily abandon her family and pet bulldog, Bailey. She also had no history of ever running away.
In August 1998, a computer engineer from Canada accurately provided a description of Amy’s tattoos to investigators. He had reportedly seen Amy with two men on a beach in Curacao. This happened five months after she went missing.
Another possible sighting occurred in January 1999. A U.S. Navy Petty Officer claimed that a woman identified herself by name and asked for help at a brothel in Curacao.
The officer did not report the incident when it happened because he was afraid of getting into trouble with the Navy for visiting a brothel. After retiring and seeing Amy’s picture in a magazine, he contacted Amy’s family. His report has never been confirmed.
In March 2005, a woman reportedly saw a woman matching Amy’s description in the restroom of a department store in Barbados. She was accompanied by three male individuals. The Barbados woman was never identified as Amy.
At the time she vanished, Amy was five feet and seven inches, weighed 120 pounds, and had green eyes and short brown hair, possibly dyed blonde. She also has four tattoos: a Tasmanian Devil on her shoulder, the sun on her lower back, a Chinese symbol on her right ankle, and a blue and green gecko on her stomach.
The FBI is offering a reward of up to $25,000 for information about the case. Anyone with information regarding the disappearance of Amy Lynn Bradley is urged to contact the FBI at (202) 324-3000.
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