Italian Cruise Ship Disaster

Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

The captain has been arrested and charged with abandoning ship and manslaughter. Seems as though a mayday wasn't even sent until after they started evacuating the ship. Ship was more than two miles off course when it hit a rock
 
Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

The Captain has been quoted "Don't blame the Skipper it's Gilligan's fault"

Ken
 
Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

A month after we made a 12 day Scandinavian cruise on the QE2 in 1992, she ripped a gash in her hull off of Newport, RI. She was traveling at 32 kts in 34' of water - she draws 30'. There was an isolated rock out croping 2' high that she hit - ripped a long gash in her hull. Luckily she was double hulled and it didn't penetrate the inner hull.

How does the math work out above? In the investigation, they found out that she "squats" 2 extra feet at 32 kts - they didn't know this before hand...thus she scraped the uncharted rock!

http://www.maib.gov.uk/publications/investigation_reports/1990_to_1998/queen_elizabeth_2.cfm
 
Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

The captain was trained by cornpop on Barnegat Bay... afraid to leave the dock... skinny water.... etc...
 
Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

Pfft.

I run 35 knots+ with less than 4 feet of water under the keel all the time.

Heck - often only 4 ft above the bottom!
 
Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

mistercomputerman said:
I am not sure I would operate MY boat at 32 knots with only 4 feet under the keel.
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One of my rules I always followed during my beginning stage of boating (on my 175BR with no GPS/Chartplotter) that kept me safe was "If depthfinder shows less than 6', I'm getting off plane". I have no idea what these guys are thinking operating multi million dollar yachts running at 32kts with 4' margin of error. IMO, it's just plain dumb.
 
According to the AIS pic, land should have been to port side, which is also where the gash is, but in the pics, land is to the starboard side. Looks like the ship was turned around and grounded to me. Even looks like he tried to dock it in that little marina.
 
Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

Turtlesboat said:
According to the AIS pic, land should have been to port side, which is also where the gash is, but in the pics, land is to the starboard side. Looks like the ship was turned around and grounded to me. Even looks like he tried to dock it in that little marina.
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Yes, that's what happened. You can see here the reconstruction of the last minutes of the ship:

rotta concordia3.jpg
 
Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

Current tally is 5 dead, 17 missing.

This could have been much worse. It will be interesting to here how this plays out -> certainly everyone seems to be blaming the captain and crew.

Putting aside the "oops" that resulted in the side being ripped out of the ship, it sounds like it took too long to start getting people to the boats.

Although. . .it seems like everything happened pretty quick. I have been in a few situations which have resulted in investigations (both as the investigator and investigatee). One thing that never fails to amaze me is how smart everyone is regarding the situation 5 to 10 days after an incident occurs. ;)
 
Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

"Iceberg right ahead"!!!!!

Those pics are crazy!! I can't believe that happened in this day & age!!!
 
Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

I hope they did a blood test on him. He apparently thought he would nose a couple hundred feet of ship into that little harbor and the people would just hop off onto shore...bam, done, not a problem.
 
Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

Woody said:
I hope they did a blood test on him. He apparently thought he would nose a couple hundred feet of ship into that little harbor and the people would just hop off onto shore...bam, done, not a problem.
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Just look at the little harbour and the scale at the bottom... the inlet is as wide as the ship!!!

rotta concordia4.jpg
 
Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

Woody said:
I hope they did a blood test on him. He apparently thought he would nose a couple hundred feet of ship into that little harbor and the people would just hop off onto shore...bam, done, not a problem.
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or. . .after everything has gone to poop and you are given the choice of "Sinking 5 miles off shore" and "Sinking just outside of a small village, with a harbor full of small boats", which would you choose?

Of course, there are several other reasons for those blood tests, and I suspect the captain won't be the only one with a needle in their arm. . . . . . .
 
Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

It is curious as to why the captain did not stop the ship in deeper water and launch the lifeboats. Those boats are used as tenders in ports where the ship has to stand off, so, the crew is familiar with loading and handling them.

Possibly the ship was taking on water so fast that the captain felt the ship was going to sink before the lifeboats could be launched and so he decided to ground the ship in shallow water.

Based on the fact that the stabilizers are deployed, it would indicate to me that the ship was run aground at a speed in excess of about 5 knots.

We'll see, but, it looks like the ship was under power and moving at a pretty good rate when it was run aground by the captain.
 
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Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

How can they tell it slipped 5cm in a sea? Is GPS that accurate?
 
Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

The ship was navigating so close to shore to “salute” the island, possibly an elderly retired captain of Costa Line living there. It was a common practice especially during the summer cruises.
A ship maître from isle of Giglio was on the commanding bridge just to have a look at his home land and he warned the pilot the ship was way too close to shore! Speed was reported to be around 17 knots.
 
Re: Cruise ship sinks in Italy...

KRB64 said:
How can they tell it slipped 5cm in a sea? Is GPS that accurate?
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It was a calm clear night. Lights were on on land. You do not need your gps to cruise clear of an island like that on a well known course. You just sail some half mile off shore of it!
 
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