How's this for an unexpected visitor: A 443-foot container ship ran aground in the yard of a Norwegian homeowner, barely missing his cabin. The ship crashed in the early morning of May 22 into the front garden of Johan Helberg, who lives near Trondheim in southcentral Norway. He woke up to find the ship just outside his door. His neighbor rang the doorbell to wake up Helberg, who had slept through the ship's arrival. "I was woken up by an annoying doorbell that just kept going on and on and on," he told Reuters. "That's probably worse than a bang like this must have been. It was a dull sound that came from the doorbell." Video:Tourists flee as roof collapses off 650-year-old building in China Neighbor Jostein Joergensen told Reuters he saw the ship coming. "I was half-awake and I heard a boat I thought was passing by, so I just wanted to get up and look out the bedroom window," said Joergensen, who said he whistled and waved to get the ship's attention. When Helberg didn't answer the doorbell, Joergensen called him on the phone. "The doorbell rang at a time of day when I don't like to open," Helberg told local television channel TV2,CBS News reported. Helberg considered himself lucky even though the ship damaged a heating pipe in his cabin. "If the ship had hit the rocky cliff right next to it, it would have lifted up and hit the house hard," he said. "It wasn't many meters off." The container ship, the NCL Salten, which flew the Cyprus flag, had 16 crew members on board, none of whom were injured in the accident. It had been passing through the Trondheim Fjord, an inlet of the Norwegian Sea. "Big ships pass us now and then," Helberg toldThe New York Times. "We don't usually see ships right outside our living room window. … So this is especially strange." The ship's watch officer has been charged with negligent navigation after he told police he had fallen asleep while on duty at the time of the incident,the BBC reported. North Sea Container Line (NCL) saidin a statementit is cooperating with Norwegian police's investigation as it attempts to get the ship off the bank. As of Friday night, the ship remained "at the point of the incident and secured. The crew remains onboard to secure the ship," NCL said. The Norwegian Coastal Administration is coordinating the salvage operation, the company said. "This is a complicated coordination and logistics operation that we hope can be put in place as soon as possible," NCL said. Contributing: Reuters. Mike Snider is a reporter on USA TODAY's Trending team. You can follow him on Threads, Bluesky, X and email him atmikegsnider&@mikegsnider.bsky.social&@mikesnider& msnider@usatoday.com What's everyone talking about?Sign up for our trending newsletter to get the latest news of the day This article originally appeared on USA TODAY:Container ship in Norway runs aground, just misses cabin
