Engineers have dismissed as "remote" the possibility that the Concordia might break apart and no longer be sound enough to be towed to the mainland to be turned into scrap. Should the Concordia break apart during the rotation, or spew out toxic materials, absorbent barriers were set in place to catch any leaks. "Even if it's 15 to 18 hours, we're OK with that. We are happy with the way things are going." Some seven hours after the rotation attempt began, the Concordia had moved upward only by a total of 10 degrees. The Costa Concordia's planned final destination is Genoa, Italy, where it will be broken down into scrap metal.
Regulatory and industry response
"I think it’s the panic, the feeling of panic, is what’s carried through over 10 years," Ian Donoff, who was on the cruise with his wife Janice for their honeymoon, told Cobiella. Ten years ago the Costa Concordia ran aground off the Tuscan island of Giglio, killing 32 people and entwining the lives of others forever. The struggle reflects the difficult reality of an industry battered by the pandemic.
Dozens of passengers leave cruise ship in Italy after COVID outbreak
In a first step to prevent pollution of the shore and assist in a refloat the ship, its oil and fuel tanks were emptied. The Genoa port authorities confirmed to AFP that the Italian positive cases were taken home by the civil protection services, while foreign passengers who tested positive were transferred to medical facilities. Nick Sloane, the senior salvage master for Titan Salvage, the American company in charge of the operation, said Monday that he was relieved the weather was cooperating after a night of light rain. The shipwreck has altered the local economy; Mayor Ortelli says tourism income has dropped by 50 percent. Traditional nature lovers who came for a week or more have been replaced by day-trippers.
Rock And A Hard Place: What To Do With Concordia
These caissons are large metal boxes into which compressed air will be pumped to float the ship. Salvage crews repaired and remounted the escaped caisson and are now finishing installation of the remaining ones. Once the ship has been lifted, two of the caissons will have to be refitted to help keep the craft ship afloat while it is being towed 240 kilometers to Genoa, where it will be dismantled. If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.
The Wreck of the Costa Concordia
Several of the ship’s crew, notably Capt. Francesco Schettino, were charged with various crimes. On Monday morning, the Italian authorities blocked the water and airspace around the island of Giglio, to ensure safety and prevent any interference with the refloating operation. In the first six or seven hours of the operation, the wreck will be lifted about seven feet using a pneumatic system, detaching the hull from a platform built nearly 100 feet underwater.
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The sad anniversary comes as the cruise industry, shut down in much of the world for months because of the coronavirus pandemic, is once again in the spotlight because of COVID-19 outbreaks that threaten passenger safety. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control last month warned people across-the-board not to go on cruises, regardless of their vaccination status, because of the risks of infection. The Concordia was supposed to take passengers on a seven-day Italian cruise from Civitavecchia to Savona. But when it deviated from its planned path to sail closer to the island of Giglio, the ship struck a reef known as the Scole Rocks.
Jacksonville's Crowley, in major salvage operation, refloats capsized Costa Concordia ship in Italy - The Florida Times-Union
Jacksonville's Crowley, in major salvage operation, refloats capsized Costa Concordia ship in Italy.
Posted: Fri, 21 Jan 2022 15:54:12 GMT [source]
Arnold Donald, chief executive of international cruiseline company Carnival, told Fox Business in June that the company has "far more demand than we have ships available to supply right now." A vice president of Legambiente Liguria told Fortune the organization is considering forming a petition to ask the Italian government to prevent cruise ship operators from parking their ships near Italy's most scenic locations. Locals are unhappy about unsightly liners marring the seaside views, making constant sound, and the potential for their negative environmental impact on the surrounding towns, according to a Fortune report published Monday.
Following the conclusion of the righting operation, the ship was kept on the platform while further inspections were made and the starboard sponsons attached. Dozens of passengers were taken off a cruise ship in Genoa, Italy, after testing positive for COVID, the operator said. As parts of the vessel emerged in the later afternoon on Monday, discolored and rusting, from the waters where the Concordia had languished, listing on its side, engineers said the operation would most likely take longer than initially planned. "And a ship with more than 4,000 people on board cannot be put under the command of such an amateur."
On that night, in an effort to entertain the passengers with a close-up view of the island, Capt. Francesco Schettino accidentally rammed the vessel into a rocky reef just a few dozen yards from shore. Lifting the ship more than 12 meters off the giant underwater platforms that have been supporting it since September will take three or four days, but raising it the first two meters will be the most dangerous part of the exercise. That’s when the hull could crack and spill out a toxic stew of chemicals, rotten food and debris trapped since the shipwreck that has been swilling around inside the sunken ship for more than two years. If the hull breaks apart, the ship would likely never be removable from Giglio in one piece and would have to be dismantled in situ. Evidence introduced in Schettino’s trial suggests that the safety of his passengers and crew wasn’t his number one priority as he assessed the damage to the Concordia. With Giglio Island lying in a protected marine area, environmental issues relating to the Concordia wreck were of particular concern.
Despite the disaster, locals have come to appreciate the crews who have spent more than a year working on the wreckage, renting out hotel rooms and vacation apartments that would otherwise have gone vacant during the winter. When it comes time to tow the ship next spring, the tanks will gradually be emptied of the water. That will make the ship buoyant enough to float off the seabed like a pair of giant water wings. Later in the rotation process, a series of tanks fixed on the exposed side of the hull will be filled with water to help pull it down. That phase of the process should rotate the ship faster than the initial phase of winching, said Costa Crociere's project manager, Franco Porcellacchia. Officials stressed that so far no appreciable pollution from inside the ship had spewed out.
Their recovery was a priority of the parbuckling but engineers have not yet seen any sign of their remains in the wreck. The reef sliced a 70-meter-long (230-foot) gash into what is now the exposed side off the hull, letting seawater rush in. Dozens of the 4,200 passengers and crew were plucked to safety by helicopters or jumped into the sea and swam to shore. Bodies of many of the dead were retrieved inside the ship, although two bodies were never found. The MS Costa Concordia, the Italian cruise ship that killed 32 people when it sank off the coast off Isola del Giglio in 2012, has just been sitting off the Tuscan coast ever since.
“It was a night that, in addition to being a tragedy, had a beautiful side because the response of the people was a spontaneous gesture that was appreciated around the world,” Ortelli said. “For us islanders, when we remember some event, we always refer to whether it was before or after the Concordia,” said Matteo Coppa, who was 23 and fishing on the jetty when the darkened Concordia listed toward shore and then collapsed onto its side in the water. A decade after that harrowing night, the survivors are grateful to have made it out alive. None of the survivors who spoke with Cobiella have been on a cruise since that day. The calamity caused changes in the cruise industry like carrying more lifejackets and holding emergency drills before leaving port.
Experts estimate that that process could take as long as two-and-a-half years, CNN writes. Scientific American is part of Springer Nature, which owns or has commercial relations with thousands of scientific publications (many of them can be found at /us). Scientific American maintains a strict policy of editorial independence in reporting developments in science to our readers. Learn and share the most exciting discoveries, innovations and ideas shaping our world today.
"I felt like (my daughters) were going to get trampled, and putting my arms around them and just holding them together and letting the sea of people go by us." Ten years after the deadly Costa Concordia cruise line disaster in Italy, survivors still vividly remember scenes of chaos they say were like something straight out of the movie "Titanic." After a long forced pause due to the pandemic, cruise lines resumed their activities in 2021. However, a sharp increase in the number of cases has been observed in recent weeks and blamed on the spread of the Omicron variant. Forty-five of them were taken off the ship in Genoa "to be taken home safely" at the company's expense, it added. "As per protocol, the COVID-positive passengers and their relatives were immediately isolated in balcony cabins and received medical attention," MSC's communications department said.
The passengers, whose infections were found through random testing, were asymptomatic or had mild symptoms, according to the Port of San Francisco. Get HISTORY’s most fascinating stories delivered to your inbox three times a week. "There was really a melee there is the best way to describe it," he told Cobiella. "It's very similar to the movie 'Titanic.' People were jumping onto the top of the lifeboats and pushing down women and children to try to get to them." Passengers struggled to escape in the darkness, clambering to get to the life boats. Alaska resident Nate Lukes was with his wife, Cary, and their four daughters aboard the ship and remembers the chaos that ensued as the ship started to sink.
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