29/10/2025
Could Missing Person Amy Bradley Still Be Alive?
In 1998, 23-year-old Amy Bradley went missing on a Caribbean cruise and hasn’t been seen since.
However, 27 years later, new leads show that she could still be alive.
Background On Amy
Amy was born on May 12, 1974, in Petersburg, Virginia. Her family included her parents, Iva and Ron Bradley, and her younger brother, Brad.
Brad and Amy were close. They would go out together and hit bars, sing karaoke, throw darts, play pool, or go bowling. The siblings would either go with one another or with a group of friends.
Amy was an athletic person. One of her hobbies was playing basketball. She also had gone into college to study physical education. Her long-term ambitions were to get a master's in sports psychology or open a sports bar.
Prior to her disappearance, Amy worked full-time at Ruth’s Chris Steak House. She cut her hours there because she was going to start a job as a marketing and office assistant at a computer company after going on a cruise with her family.
Sadly, Amy never returned.
The Cruise
Ron was an insurance agent who sold $145,000 in paid premiums for Illinois Mutual Life. He was one of about 35 agents who won an all-expenses-paid family cruise.
On Saturday, March 21, 1998, Amy boarded Royal Caribbean’s Rhapsody of the Seas with her parents and brother in San Juan, Puerto Rico. The ship arrived in Aruba on Monday, March 23, 1998, in the early morning.
At 1 a.m. on Tuesday, March 24, 1998, the ship left Aruba and was headed to Curacao, Antilles. This was when what was supposed to be a fun family trip got turned upside down.
When the ship departed from Aruba, the Bradley family was at a midnight buffet. Iva and Ron had retired back to their cabin, while Amy and Brad were out partying until a quarter to 4 a.m.
Amy’s Disappearance
The last time Amy was seen was when Ron woke up around 5:30 a.m. and saw her legs on the balcony chair. By 6 a.m., when the ship docked in Curacao, Ron woke up again, and Amy was gone. After searching for an hour, Ron and Iva reported their daughter missing.
According to the FBI’s description, Amy had short brown hair and green eyes. She was also white, 5 feet 6 inches tall, and weighed 120 pounds.
Other distinguishing features were Amy’s tattoos, which included a Tasmanian Devil spinning a basketball on her shoulder, the sun on her lower back, a Chinese symbol on her right ankle, and a Gecko lizard on her navel. One more distinguishing feature Amy had was a navel ring.
Looking For Amy
Ron and Iva pleaded with the crew to keep the other passengers on the ship. The employees were initially unwilling to announce anything because they thought it was too early, and they didn’t want to wake the other guests. After getting a meeting with a supervisor, the Bradleys got an announcement made over the ship’s loudspeaker.
A search of the ship and an aerial hunt were conducted, but Amy could not be found.
Even after the announcement, a ship employee wanted to let the passengers off the ship. Iva begged them not to because if someone kidnapped Amy, then they wouldn’t be able to take her off the boat. The ship staff did not listen and let the passengers go.
Ron, Iva, and Brad eventually got off the ship, too. They spent four days in Curacao, hoping something would come up regarding Amy. When there were no leads, the family traveled back to Chesterfield County to set up a hotline and website for information about Amy.
One person was a possible link to Amy’s disappearance.
The Mysterious Band Member
Brad and Amy went to a limbo party on the ship with their parents before they went to bed. The party had a Calypso band performing named Blue Orchid.
Amy began talking to the band’s bassist, who just went by Yellow, which was short for High Yellow. High Yellow was Caribbean slang for light black skin. In a Style Weekly archive, Yellow was described as “a pudgy, bald Grenadan.”
The Bradleys eventually moved on to a different area of the ship, but this was supposedly not the last time Amy saw Yellow.
Two young female passengers were on a glass elevator at 5:30 a.m., heading up to the disco. They claimed they saw Amy on the elevator with Yellow. However, fifteen minutes after this, the girls saw Yellow leave the disco without Amy.
Another thing that put Yellow on the authorities’ radar was when he spoke to Brad. While waiting by the pool deck to see if his sister showed up, Brad saw Yellow approach him. Yellow told Brad, “Hey man, I’m sorry about your sister.”
After Yellow asked what happened, Brad began to tell Yellow, only for him to tell Brad to wait so he could get a friend to listen, too. Yellow also told Brad he was feeling “guilty,” which felt odd to Brad.
Another thing that got the Bradleys’ attention regarding Yellow was a Rhapsody passenger’s post on a cruise-ship computer bulletin board about Yellow. The post told female passengers to stay away from him. The reasons were not listed.
Nothing came of Yellow, though, because he had voluntarily submitted to a polygraph test for the FBI and passed.
Another Search
The Bradleys returned to Curacao a month after Amy went missing. A taxi driver said he saw Amy after she went missing. She was running and looking for a phone. However, nothing came from the search.
Theories On What Happened To Amy
Numerous people saw Amy, and these sightings indicated a potential theory that Amy was trafficked and that captors held her.
One of the female bartenders on the ship added to this theory in a 2025 docuseries called “Amy Bradley Is Missing.” She said on the night Amy went missing, she said these exact words to passengers and the crew, “Señorita kidnapped! Señorita kidnapped!” Someone eventually told the bartender to “shut up.”
Another theory was that Amy got off the ship on her own free will and started a new life in the Caribbean. While an unlikely theory, the docuseries said past activity was detected on Amy’s missing person website. IP addresses from Barbados were detected on American holidays and days significant to the Bradley family.
What made this theory improbable was that if Amy was kidnapped, her kidnappers could have checked the website for updates on the case. Others believed that if Amy left willingly, she might have checked the website as a way to feel close to her family.
The third theory was that Amy might have a child due to being forced into s*x work. The theory came about because of new evidence that suggested at least one child was born.
With these new leads from the docuseries, the FBI is offering a $25,000 reward for information leading to her recovery.
Written by: Rachel Borchers
Social Media Contributing Writer
