A woman is missing after she fell overboard from a P&O ship during a week-long cruise in the Pacific.
Rough conditions are hampering the search after a Pacific Dawn crew member raised the alarm around 4pm on Thursday (local time), about 150 nautical miles west of New Caledonia.
"A crew member notified the bridge straight away and the 'man overboard' incident response was activated immediately," Carnival Australia spokesman David Jones said in a statement.
"In line with this response, Pacific Dawn turned around to follow the course it was on at the time of the incident."
It's believed the woman went on to the deck to be sick when a freak wave knocked her overboard,Nine Network reported on Friday.
The Australian Maritime Safety Authority and New Caledonian authorities issued a call for nearby vessels to assist in the search.
An AMSA spokeswoman told AAP on Friday morning there was no further update yet on the search.
"We are still continuing our search at this time," she said.
A ship passenger, who asked not to be named, described the atmosphere onboard as "very sad, solemn and quiet".
A Brisbane man holidaying on the ship with his family, who also asked not to be identified, told AAP conditions in the search area were rough, with three-to-four metre swells.
He said little information was being given to passengers about the situation other than they were searching for the missing woman.
Another passenger, Jonathan Trevithick, posted an image on Twitter of a ring buoy floating in the ocean and said the situation was "horrendous".
The ship had departed from Brisbane on Saturday.
