The man who went overboard from the Carnival Panorama has been identified as Thomas Gigler, 56, of Redlands, California, according to the Daily Mail, as cited by The Western Journal. Carnival said shipboard CCTV confirmed he went overboard. Why it happened is not known.
What the Daily Mail and Carnival reported
The Daily Mail reported that Gigler was six days into a Mexican Riviera cruise with his wife, Michelle, 48, and their three sons, ages 13, 11, and 9, when he was discovered missing Saturday morning. The outlet said crew members paged him for about four hours without a response. The ship turned around between 2 p.m. and 3 p.m., and a shipwide search began at about 3:30 p.m., the Daily Mail reported.
“When notified of a missing guest, the ship’s team initiated search and investigation procedures, including reviewing CCTV footage and notifying both the US and Mexico Coast Guards,” Carnival said in a statement quoted by The Western Journal. The company said it offered support to Gigler’s family.
The Daily Mail said staff reviewed security video and “confirmed the worst – Gigler had jumped overboard and was lost at sea off the coast of Baja California.” The report did not specify when the confirming footage was recorded. The ship continued its trip from Puerto Vallarta to Long Beach while the search was handed to local authorities, according to the Daily Mail. As of that report, no body had been found.
Timeline on board, with one claim from a passenger tweet
In a post on X dated Sept. 22, 2026, user Tony Lane wrote that “Passengers were locked in their rooms for hours during the search.” This claim is from a social media post and has not been independently verified here.
Family details and disputed allegation
The Daily Mail reported Gigler had worked as a computer programmer at Esri for 24 years. The couple would have marked their 15th wedding anniversary the following Wednesday, the outlet said.
The Daily Mail also relayed an unnamed passenger’s claim that Gigler told someone at a ship bar the night before that he had marital problems. Gigler’s sister, Wendy Dowden, disputed that account in comments to the newspaper, saying the couple “were getting along quite well.” She added, “We think something must have happened in his head. He wasn’t in his right mind to have done this.” The Daily Mail reported he had no known history of mental illness.
What remains unknown
The reason Gigler went overboard has not been established in the reporting cited. Key details—including the exact timing of the CCTV footage and independent corroboration of passenger accounts—were not provided in the Daily Mail’s summary.
