Costa Concordia disaster
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Costa Concordia disasterCosta Concordia during salvage operation, July 2013
Date / 13January2012
Location / Off Isola del Giglio, Tuscany, Italy, Mediterranean Sea
Type / Ship grounding
Cause / Struck a rock while deviating from planned course
Participants / 4,252[1] (3,206 passengers; 1,023 crew and personnel)[2]
Deaths / 33 (32 passengers and crew, 1 salvage member)
Injuries / 64
Captain / Francesco Schettino
Operator / Costa Crociere
Salvage / · Fuel and oil extraction: March 2012
· Righting: September 2013
· Refloated and towed: July 2014
The Italian cruise ship Costa Concordia[p 1] capsized and sank after striking an underwater rock obstruction off Isola del Giglio,[p 2] Tuscany, on 13 January 2012, with the loss of 32 lives.
The ship, carrying 4,252 people, was on the first leg of a cruise around the Mediterranean Sea, starting from Civitavecchia in Lazio, Italy, when she deviated from her planned route at the Isola del Giglio, coming closer to that island, and struck a rock formation on the sea floor.
The impact could be heard by passengers on board and caused a temporary power blackout when water flooded the engine room. The captain, Francesco Schettino, ordered evacuation after an hour of drifting, during which the ship had started to list. Meanwhile, the harbour authorities were alerted by worried passengers, and vessels were sent to the rescue. During a six-hour evacuation, most passengers were brought ashore. The search for missing people continued for several months, with all but two being accounted for. The ship was righted on 17 September 2013, and on 24 October 2013 it was reported that DNA analysis of one body found earlier in the same month confirmed it was the body of missing Italian passenger Maria Grazia Trecarichi.[3]
Costa Concordia, operated by Costa Crociere (Costa Cruises), is one of the largest ships ever to be abandoned,[citation needed] dominating international media in the days after the disaster. Captain Schettino was arrested on preliminary charges of manslaughter in connection with causing a shipwreck, failing to assist 300 passengers, and failing to be the last to leave the wreck.[4] He was later charged with failing to describe to maritime authorities the scope of the disaster[5][6] and with abandoning incapacitated passengers.[7] Costa Cruises offered compensation to passengers (to a limit of €11,000 a person) to pay for all damages, including the value of the cruise. One-third of the passengers took this offer. The company also at first offered to pay Captain Schettino's legal costs, but later changed its position.
There were immediate fears of an ecological disaster, because the partially submerged wreck was in danger of slipping into much deeper water, with a risk of oil pollution that could have devastated the popular tourist zone. In the end, no significant fuel leak occurred, and all the fuel was extracted safely from the ship by 24 March 2012. Costa Concordia has been officially declared a "constructive total loss" by the insurance company, with her salvage expected to be "one of the biggest maritime salvage operations".[8] On 16 September 2013, the parbuckle salvage of the ship began.[9] The operation started late that day due to bad weather,[10] and by the early hours of 17 September 2013 the wreck was set upright on its underwater cradle.[11]
In July 2014, the ship was refloated by large caissons (metal tanks) attached to its sides and was towed 200 miles (320 kilometers) to its home port of Genoa.[12] There the ship will be dismantled and materials from the ship will be recycled.[13][14]
On 11 February 2015, after a trial of more than eighteen months, Captain Schettino was found guilty of manslaughter of 32 passengers by the Judge Giovanni Puliatti and sentenced to 16 years in prison. Prosecutors had asked for a 26-year sentence, but the court gave Schettino ten years for multiple manslaughter, five years for causing the shipwreck, one year for abandoning the passengers, and one month for providing false information to port authorities. He is expected to appeal.[15][16] He would remain free during the lengthy Italian appeal process.[17]
Contents
· 1 Route
o 1.1 Situation on the bridge
o 1.2 Situation on deck
· 2 Rescue
o 2.1 Evacuation
o 2.2 Search for missing people
· 3 Wreck
o 3.1 Securing wreck site and protecting environment
o 3.2 Salvage
§ 3.2.1 The parbuckling
§ 3.2.2 Images of righting of Costa Concordia
§ 3.2.3 Refloating and removal
· 4 Loss and compensation
o 4.1 Passengers and personnel
o 4.2 Ship
· 5 Investigations
o 5.1 Criminal proceedings against officers
o 5.2 Recorded evidence
o 5.3 Trials
· 6 Reactions
o 6.1 Costa Cruises and its parent companies
o 6.2 Regulatory and industry response
o 6.3 Media
§ 6.3.1 In Italy
· 7 Honors and memorial
· 8 Safety regulations
· 9 Timeline of wrecking
· 10 See also
· 11 Notes
· 12 References
· 13 External links
Route
MS Costa Concordia before the disaster
Wrecked ship with boulder in hull gash
Costa Concordia (call sign: IBHD, IMO number: 9320544, MMSI number: 247158500), with 3,206 passengers and 1,023 crew members on board,[2] was sailing off Isola del Giglio on the night of 13 January 2012, having begun a planned seven-day cruise from Civitavecchia to Savona and five other ports.[18] She struck her port side on a reef[19][20] at 21:42 or 21:45 local time.[21] The reef is charted as an area known as Le Scole,[22][23] about 800 metres (870yd) south of the entrance to the harbour of Giglio Porto, on the island's east coast. The initial impact was at a point 8 metres (26ft) below water at the "Scola piccola"[19][24] 42°21′20″N 10°55′50″E, the most seaward exposed rock of Le Scole, which tore a 50-metre (160ft) gash in the ship's port side below the water line.[25] The impact sheared two long strips of steel from the ship's hull; these were later found on the seabed 92 to 96 metres (302 to 315ft) from the main island.[19][26] The ship has a large boulder embedded in her hull at the aft end of the impact gash.[27] A few minutes after the impact, the head of the engine room warned the captain that the hull had an irreparable tear of 70 metres (230ft)[28] through which water entered and submerged the generators and engines.[29]
Without propulsive power and on emergency electric power, the ship "shifted position only by means of inertia and the rudders"[4] and continued north from Le Scole until well past Giglio Porto.[30] Captain Schettino has said various instruments were not functioning.[31] Reports differ whether the ship listed to port soon after the impact and when she began listing to starboard.[32][33] At 22:10, the vessel turned south. The vessel was then listing to starboard, initially by about 20°, coming to rest by 22:44[34] at Punta del Gabbianara in about 20 metres[35] of water at an angle of heel of about 70°. Captain Schettino attributes the final grounding of the ship at Punta del Gabbianara to his own effort to manoeuvre the ship there.[36] In contrast, on 3 February, the chief of the Italian Coast Guard testified that the final grounding of the ship at Punta del Gabbianara may not have been related to any attempts to manoeuvre the ship.[37]
Situation on the bridge
Captain Schettino stated that, before approaching the island, he turned off the alarm system for the ship's computer navigation system.[38] "I was navigating by sight, because I knew those seabeds well. I had done the move three, four times."[39] He told investigators that he saw waves breaking on the reef and turned abruptly, swinging the side of the hull into the reef.[40] "I have to take responsibility for the fact that I made a judgment error."[40] "This time I ordered the turn too late."[41] The captain initially stated that the ship was about 300 metres (330yd) from the shore (about the length of the vessel) and hit an uncharted rock.[42] However, the ship's first officer, Ciro Ambrosio, told investigators that Schettino had left his reading glasses in his cabin and repeatedly asked Ambrosio to check the radar for him.[43][44]
The captain said that Costa Cruises managers told him to perform a sail-past salute on 13 January 2012.[45] Previously, on 14 August 2011, the ship took a similar sail-past route, but not as close to Le Scole.[46] The 14 August 2011 sail-past was approved by Costa Cruises and was done in daylight during an island festival.[39] The normal shipping route passes about 8km (5mi) offshore.[47][48][p 3] Costa Cruises confirmed that the course taken in 2012 was "not a defined [computer programmed] route for passing Giglio."[49][p 4] In an interview with the Italian TV channel Canale 5 on 10 July 2012, Schettino stated that this was a contributing factor to the accident.[50] In addition, at the captain's invitation, the maître d'hôtel of the ship, who is from the island, was on the ship's bridge to view the island during the sail-past.[51] A further person on the bridge was a Moldovan dancer, Domnica Cemortan, who testified that she was in a romantic relationship with Captain Schettino and had just boarded the ship as a non-paying passenger.[52]
Situation on deck
Passengers were in the dining hall when there was a sudden, loud bang, which a crew member (speaking over the intercom) ascribed to an "electrical failure".[53] "We told the guests everything was [okay] and under control and we tried to stop them panicking", a cabin steward recalled.[32] Coincidentally, when the ship first made impact with the rock, it was claimed that Titanic's theme song My Heart Will Go On was playing in a restaurant.[54][55][56] The ship lost cabin electrical power shortly after the initial collision.[57] "The boat started shaking. The noise—there was panic, like in a film, dishes crashing to the floor, people running, people falling down the stairs," said a survivor. Those on board said the ship suddenly tilted to the port side.[32] Passengers were later advised to put on their life jackets.[53] Half an hour before the abandon ship order, one crew member was recorded on video telling passengers at a muster station, "We have solved the problems we had and invite everyone to return to their cabins."[37] When the ship later turned around, she began to list approximately 20° to the starboard side, creating problems in launching the lifeboats. The president of Costa Cruises, Gianni Onorato, said normal lifeboat evacuation became "almost impossible" because the ship listed so quickly.[58]
· Maps of route
·
Route of Mediterranean cruise from Civitavecchia and back. Arrow: journey on first leg, star: collision
·
Planned route (starting at 18:20 UTC) together with deviation (starting at 20:10 UTC) ending off Giglio[59]
·
Deviation (from 20:30 UTC) leading to collision (20:45 UTC) and grounding (22:00 UTC)[60]
·
Route leading to collision compared to route of 14 August 2011
·
Timeline of the disaster
·
Close up of the disaster
Rescue
Aground with rigid lifeboats in foreground and inflatables hanging from the side of the ship
After the grounding, passengers and crew were taken ashore from the ship by lifeboats and helicopters or swam to the island, leaving about 40 people missing. Half of these were later found inside the ship, most of them deceased.[citation needed]
Evacuation
In the first contact, made at 22:12, between Italian port officials and the Costa Concordia after the impact on the reef, an unidentified officer on board the cruise ship insisted that she was suffering only from an electrical "black-out".[21] A passenger's video recorded at 22:20 showed panicked passengers in life jackets being told by a crew member that "everything is under control" and that they should return to their cabins.[61][62] No lifeboat passenger evacuation drill had taken place for the approximately 600 passengers who had just embarked.[63] A ship's cook said that Captain Schettino ordered dinner around 22:30.[64] Around the same time, a patrol boat of the Guardia di Finanza made a call to the Costa Concordia, but no answer came.[65]
Captain Schettino participated in three telephone calls with the cruise line's crisis management officer.[33] At 22:26, Schettino told the Port of Livorno's harbour master that the ship had taken water through an opening in the port side and requested a tug boat.[66] Port authorities were not alerted to the collision until 22:42, about an hour after the impact, and the order to evacuate the ship was not given until 22:50.[67] Some passengers jumped into the water to swim to shore,[68] while others, ready to evacuate the vessel, were delayed by crew members up to 45 minutes, as they resisted immediately lowering the lifeboats.[69] Some sources report that the ship did not list until 23:15 and therefore if Schettino had given the order to abandon ship, the lifeboats could have been launched earlier, allowing the passengers to reach safety.[19][33] In contrast, one expert stated that a delay might be justified considering the hazards in launching lifeboats while a ship is still moving.[70]
Rescued passengers huddle ashore.
Staff or 2nd captain Roberto Bosio, is said to have coordinated some of the deck officers in much of the evacuation. He began to evacuate the ship before Schettino's order.[71] Many junior officers and crew members who were aware of the severity of the situation also began readying lifeboats and moving passengers from their cabins before the abandon ship orders were given, a move that has been characterised as a "mutiny".[19][29]
While the vast majority of the ship's multinational personnel held positions that did not require a seaman's qualifications (as they handled services like laundry, cooking, entertainment, cleaning, minding children, and waiting tables), according to a senior shipping official, they had received mandatory training in basic safety to be able to help in situations like this. Although all of them speak at least basic English, most speak no Italian.[72] Several passengers asserted that the crew did not help or were untrained in launching the lifeboats. This allegation was denied by the crew, one of whom stated, "The crew members, whether Filipino or Colombians or Indians, tried to the best of our ability to help passengers survive the shipwreck. Comments by some of the passengers that we were unhelpful have hurt us."[73] A third engineer officer from the ship's engine room also pointed out that "Unlike the captain, we were there until the end. We did all we could to avoid catastrophe."[29] Costa Cruises CEO Pier Luigi Foschi praised the crew and personnel, despite difficulties resulting from the apparent lack of direction from the ship's officers and problems in communication.[72]