Faster Pussycat frontman Taime Downe has finally broken his silence on the mysterious cruise ship death of his fiancee Kimberly Burch.
Burch, 56, died tragically by falling from a room balcony during the first night of The 80s Cruise aboard the Royal Caribbean cruise ship, Explorer of the Seas, on March 2.
Kimberly, a realtor, had joined the seven-day cruise to show her support for Taime, a member of a punk band scheduled to perform onboard. The cruise had set sail from Miami and was supposed to make stops at Nassau, San Juan, and Labadee.
In a heartfelt statement shared on SiriusXM’s Trunk Nation With Eddie Trunk via Blabbermouth on May 30, Downe, 60, expressed his sorrow over the loss of his long-time partner, saying, “I’m just taking it a day at a time, hanging in there, as I navigate life without her.”
‘And everybody thought going out on the road and doing what I do and being with my family in my band would be good for me.’
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Addressing numerous theories about Burch’s state of mind at the time of her passing, he said: ‘I don’t wanna get into what her psyche was at the time, but there’s a lot of things that make up people’s lives at a certain time of their life… It’s been hard on everybody.’
Downe then claimed that the circumstances of Kimberly’s death were ‘alcohol and prescription related.’
He said: ‘So I blame alcohol and pills on it. There’s no way I’d touch booze. For me, that’s just completely disgusting in my brain, you know what I mean? So I’ve got some hatred for booze, ’cause I loved the hell out of Kimberly, and it was just hard to deal with. We spent basically nine years together.
‘This is just heavy s**t, and I’m just looking forward to playing shows and having fun.
‘It’s good to talk about it. It’s good to talk about it with my friends, my close-knit friends. But I don’t really wanna talk about it with strangers, ’cause it doesn’t seem appropriate. It is what it is.’
Hours before Burch’s death she had posed up with Downe on the ship and wrote: ‘We made it to @the80scruise.’
Kimberly is said to have gone overboard on the first day of the cruise around 11pm PST – with a guest claiming on X she had ‘jumped from the balcony of her 8th floor room’ 80 miles from Miami.
They wrote: ‘Currently on the #RCL Explorer of the Seas for the #80scruise. Unfortunately, we have a “woman overboard’ situation and boats have been deployed. We are currently 80+ miles from Miami at 11pm PST. Not good.
‘It looks like the woman “jumped” from the balcony of her 8th floor room after an argument with her partner. This is our 15th cruise, and the first time we’ve actually experienced this.
‘Clearly, the priority is recovering the woman. And the boat has turned around and is at a dead stop. They have deployed boats for the search. Could be a long night….
Another guest wrote: ‘Person overboard on Royal Caribbean Explorer of the Seas. On the 80s Cruise. Just saw a great show by Squeeze, then it was announced a person is overboard. Ship is stopped and searching. Other nearby ships helping.
A US Coast Guard spokesperson said the incident happened roughly 20 miles from Freeport, Bahamas.
The Coast Guard deployed a helicopter crew and other personnel to assist the Royal Bahamas Defense Force in their search – which was later suspended.
Kimberly and Taime had been together for around ‘five or six years.’
A passenger also told THR: ‘There was an announcement over the PA saying someone went overboard so the ship was going to stop and turn around to try and locate the person.
‘[The] ship was stopped for a few hours. Safety boats were deployed with floodlights to illuminate the surrounding area. Another cruise ship nearby had its floodlights on searching as well. My wife spoke with some people on one of the decks saying they heard that it was a woman and it was caught on camera. Can’t confirm though.
‘Eventually the ship powered up and off we went. This morning a PA announcement said that the US Coast Guard had taken over the search. We arrived at Nassau, Bahamas a few hours behind schedule. No excursions were canceled. Haven’t heard anything since.’
DailyMail.com previously contacted representatives for Taime Downe, The 80s Cruise and Royal Caribbean for comment.
Downe was reportedly questioned by police when the ship docked at the Port Of Miami after the death but was later released.
It was revealed video had been captured of Burch’s last moments alive – with the realtor allegedly seen ‘climbing the ship’s rail and taking a step off’ in the clip.
Downe’s bandmates disembarked the ship at the Port of Miami around 6:45am local time after Burch’s death and waited for ‘several hours for their lead singer to join them’ as police launched their investigation.
A source close to Burch exclusively told Daily Mail earlier this year that Downe and Burch were overheard ‘loudly arguing’ before her tragic death.
The insider said: ‘The argument was in their cabin, their neighbors heard only yelling but nothing specific being yelled out.
‘Their relationship looked amazing otherwise, there was never any complaints, little or big from either of them, they seemed to be in love with each other, very much.’
The source added they had heard ‘scattered stories Burch was drunk’ on the night of her death but said Burch ‘didn’t really drink and had helped Downe with his sobriety’.
Kimberly’s mother Carnell Burch told TMZ Taime had called her to reveal Kimberly had died and that it is ‘still unclear’ whether her daughter jumped or accidentally fell from the ship, although she is ‘confident Kimberly would not purposefully hurt herself.’
Kimberly was drinking on the cruise, Carnell said, which was ‘out of character for her’ and Carnell claimed her daughter had had an argument with Taime before her death.
Carnell added her daughter was not suffering from depression or emotional issues at the time and was excited for the trip, which was in its first day and featured musical acts including Squeeze, Adam Ant, Tiffany and Men at Work.
Glam metal band Faster Pussycat formed in 1985 comprised of Downe, guitarists Greg Steele and Brent Muscat and bassist Kelly Nickels.
They forged a successful career over the late 1980s and early 1990s, selling over two million records worldwide
They have released four albums, Faster Pussycat (1987), Wake Me When It’s Over (1989), Whipped! (1992) and The Power and the Glory Hole (2006).
They broke up in 1993, but reformed in 2001.
Former drummer Brett Bradshaw died on March 26, 2021, at age 50.
