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A 440-foot ship nearly hit a Norway cabin as its owner slept. The helmsman was reportedly asleep too.

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The helmsman of a huge container ship that ran aground in Norway several feet away from a cabin as its owner slept was probably asleep as well at the time of the accident, Norwegian media reported Friday.

“Only one person was on the bridge at the time. He was steering the vessel, but didn’t change course when entering the Trondheim fjord as he should have,” the news agency NTB reported.

“Police have received information from others who were on board that he was asleep,” police official Kjetil Bruland Sorensen told NTB.

The 443-foot NCL Salten sailed up onto shore next to Johan Helberg’s wooden cabin around dawn on Thursday.

Johan Helberg poses next to his house and a 443-foot-long container ship by the shore in the Trondheimsfjord outside Byneset by Trondheim, Norway, on May 22, 2025, after the ship ran aground, almost hitting his house.

Jan Langhaug/NTB/AFP via Getty Images


Helberg discovered the unexpected visitor only when a panicked neighbor who had rung his doorbell repeatedly to no avail gave up and called him on the phone.

“The doorbell rang at a time of day when I don’t like to open,” Helberg told television channel TV2.

His neighbor, Jostein Jorgensen, said he was roused at around 5 a.m. by the sound of a ship heading at full speed toward land and immediately ran to Helberg’s house.

The massive vessel reportedly caused damage to a heating pipe in Helberg’s cabin, TV2 reported, but the homeowner said he considered himself lucky.

“If the ship had hit the rocky cliff right next to it, it would have lifted up and hit the house hard,” he told TV2. “It wasn’t many meters off.”

People stand near a container ship, which almost hit a house, in Trondheim, Norway, May 22, 2025.

People stand near a container ship, which almost hit a house, in Trondheim, Norway, May 22, 2025.

NTB/Jan Langhaug/via Reuters


None of the cargo ship’s 16 crew members were injured, and Norwegian police have opened an investigation.

“We are aware of the police stating that they have one suspect, and we continue to assist the police and authorities in their ongoing investigation,” the NCL shipping group said Friday.

“We are also conducting internal inquiries but prefer not to speculate further,” it added.

Bente Hetland, the CEO of the shipping company, told TV2 that the same ship ran aground twice before — once in 2023 in Hadsel and again in 2024, in Ålesund.

Efforts to refloat the ship have failed so far, and the massive red and green container ship remained stuck, looming over the small cabin.

An aerial view shows a 443-foot-long container ship by the shore in the Trondheimsfjord outside Byneset by Trondheim, Norway, on May 22, 2025, after it ran aground, almost hitting a house.

An aerial view shows a 443-foot-long container ship by the shore in the Trondheimsfjord outside Byneset by Trondheim, Norway, on May 22, 2025, after it ran aground, almost hitting a house.

Jan Langhaug/NTB/AFP via Getty Images


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