A travel blogger who watched Queen Mary 2's bow line snap during a Mediterranean cruise said the vessel was ‘dangerously close’ to crashing into a yacht worth millions of pounds.

Morgan O’Brien, 49, who travels the world filming his experiences of cruises, watched in amazement as the Cunard vessel was battered by strong winds and broke free from her moorings while at port in Civitavecchia, Italy.

On August 4, high-velocity winds caused the £850m ship’s bow line to snap which led the forward and aft gangways to drop into the water.

As a result, the cruise line started to drift away from the pier.

Tugs held the ship in place until new lines could be secured, and no injuries were reported. One of the gangways was later recovered.

Daily Echo: Morgan's videos shows Queen Mary 2 being assisted by three tugboats

Speaking to the Echo from Hamburg in Germany, Morgan, a YouTube blogger, said: “[After being out in the wind and rain] I went back into the ship and dried off a little.

“I then decided to go back outside and film the strong winds and that’s when I saw the Queen Mary 2 ship in a strange position.

“It was floating at a strange angle towards a luxury yacht on the other side of the harbour. And there were three tugboats pushing against it to try to stop it.”

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After returning to his cabin, his eyes remained on the vessel as harbour staff scrambled to get the ship under control.

He said: “I saw at least one tugboat racing past my window towards the Queen Mary 2 ship, it must have been very bad.

“It wasn’t until afterwards that I realised the seriousness of the situation and that was a real emergency."

Cunard's vessel was drifting in the direction of a nearby yacht which caused Morgan to start filming for his YouTube channel, Very unOfficial Travel Guides.

He said: “At the time this luxury yacht was refuelling and if it had been struck by [Queen Mary 2] it could have ended in a bad accident. It got dangerously close to the yacht. The damage could have been worth thousands.”

The 49-year-old, who was born in the United States but now lives in Hamburg, praised the work of the harbour staff and ship crews as they worked to get the ship under control.

He added: "Things like this don’t happen often and what happened was due to the weather conditions, but the crew of Queen Mary 2 and the staff of the harbour workers reacted accordingly."

Daily Echo: Queen Mary

Hours after the incident, as the cruise which Morgan was on sailed to the Italian city of Savona, he saw Cunard’s ship was back under control.

Cunard said the vessel underwent an inspection before departing for its next port of call, Valencia in Spain, where more inspections took place.

Queen Mary 2 then returned to Southampton.