Cruise Ship Costa Concordia - MERGED THREADS

[lolarose]

sooner or later they're gonna hit the wall

[downunder]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

If you ask me, the most likely explanation of the accident is that the bridge simply got too close, navigating to a chart plotter as if playing a video game. They assumed that if the plotter told them they were in good water, they must be. But the scale of the plotter does not correspond to the accuracy of the underlying charts. Their charts are no better than the ones you and I use. They were too close and hit a rock. This is also speculation, but I will bet dollars to donuts that this is what comes out in the end.

sounds plausable.

[PyotrBee]

Originally Posted by lolarose

sooner or later they're gonna hit the wall

Really depends on the port. I dont know the depths of that location, but some places are incredibly deep just offshore.

[David_Old_Jersey]

Might find that someone had zoomed out the Chartplotter a bit too much - thereby losing detail.....like a small rock.

IME some people simply can't resist constantly fiddling with their electronic toys......makes it hard to monitor WTF is going on when a point of reference changes all the time, or you don't realise it has.

[lolarose]

Originally Posted by PyotrBee

Really depends on the port. I dont know the depths of that location, but some places are incredibly deep just offshore.

50, 60 meters, but sometimes they are passing barely 100 metars of shore

[PyotrBee]

Originally Posted by lolarose

50, 60 meters, but sometimes they are passing barely 100 metars of shore

Again.. location location.. some places drop off so quickly that to anchor they have to get in close...

[lolarose]

Originally Posted by PyotrBee

Again.. location location.. some places drop off so quickly that to anchor they have to get in close...

i know, i spent more then 15 years as a mate (deck officer) on large vessels. problem is they are not droping ancor. they are just "passing through" to say hello like that italian moron.

Cruise Ship, Dubrovnik - YouTube

COSTA SERENA - DUBROVNIK - YouTube

[hpeer]

Decades ago I was on a C-130 flown through the straights into St. Johns, Newfoundland to impress the pilots local squeeze. I had pictures looking UP at Signal Hill.

Also have been on C-130 flight deck and felt rather strong pull up. Looking over pilots shoulder saw we were pass UP through 40'. We had one C-130 get smacked by a wave, or so I was told by an impressed crew member.

So the little stunt gone awry sounds most credible to me.

The Natural Wonders of Newfoundland – A Bunch of Unrelated Things

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by MacG

@IslandHopper :
Too late to answer that - time has already expended.

There are still more people on board then was published. At leas another 20 plus four crewmembers. So far 6 victims are found. There is still some hope of finding people alive.

MacG you need to apologise to the brave men of the Italian coast guard, military and firemen, all off whom are professionals doing a difficult job. How dare you, quite frankly.

[kaimusailing]

If you have been on the bridge of a large ship in proximity of other ships or coastal obstructions, the difference in scale compared to us cruising sailors is immediately evident. My brother is a harbor pilot and I've been with him many times and can only marvel at his skill in bringing a huge vessel through a narrow channel. Even anchoring with vessels nearly a mile apart looks intimidating. When you have to go to the other side of the bridge to see the edge of the channel just a few meters from the hull, you can appreciate the skill and the requirement to have such pilots aboard in harbor channels and close to shore.
One incident which was an anchor job, required the vessel to put out several cables of anchor chain. The bottom is steep, so they had to anchor out far enough not to swing into the reef. The captain lied about how much chain he had and delayed the deployment of the anchor. The ship could have hit the reef, unanchored, but somehow they finally grabbed and the truth came out.
He has piloted many cruise ships and they treat him well, are generally well outfitted, and they are professionals that don't do stupid things to impress each other. This Italian captain looks like one of the liar types.

[goboatingnow]

Reading to latest few threads people seem to getting more confused. It is now reported on all the media that the ship hit the outer seaward ledge of la scole. The rock formation south of the port. It did not hit anything near the port itself.

The ship then carried on into near the actual port as in the 20 minutes it became obvious to the crew that the damage was mortal. The captain then anchored and swung the ship through 180 to ensure it listed towards the shore rather then sink in deep water.

The ship remained largely upright for several hours allowing the crew with shoreside help to get over 4000 passengers off in around 2 hours, a very credible performance, reports of lack of organisation etc seem to be very far off the mark. No doubt language difficulties did not help, but it seemed the crew acted in a professional manner.

Reports today do not suggest many if any remain in the hull. Most reports now put the number missing at 16 and it is expected that some are merely miscounted. While every death is a tragedy , the extremely low one here is a tribute to the efforts of the crew and position of the ship.

There is no doubt that the crazy reasons for coming so close will emerge. Those in charge will righty suffer significant consequences. I suspect this was purely human error not a failure of systems.

It Ill behoves those who criticise the rescue services or the italian maritime investigation, the uninformed that think the NTSB is some standard bearer need to do a lot lot more reading. I'm sure the Italian investigation will be to the highest maritime standards and their penalties are very high.

It is now disputed whether the captain did leave the ship prematurely. As more eyewitness testimony comes to light, all will be revealed.

A forum such as this should not engage in denigrating rescue or ill-informed conclusions nor use it to advance ones own prejudices on chars or what not. We are trying to understand what happened that's all
Dave

[St. Elsewhere]

NBC news reports "Schettino has told Italian television that the ship hit rocks that were not marked on maps and were not detected by navigation systems."

Rocks not detected by navigation systems sounds like Concordia was equipped with side scan sonar. If so, they should have known they were too close prior to impact. It raises more questions about why they got so close to shore.

[PyotrBee]

Give the rock embedded into the hull, it should be easy for divers to find where it broke off of.

[hpeer]

Excite News - Missing raised to 29 in Italian cruise disaster

Missing raised to 29 in Italian cruise disaster

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Jan 16, 6:30 PM (ET)

By NICOLE WINFIELD and FRANCES D'EMILIO
ROME (AP) - Italy's cruise liner tragedy turned into an environmental crisis Monday, as rough seas battering the stricken mega-ship raised fears that fuel might leak into pristine waters off Tuscany that are part of a protected sanctuary for dolphins, porpoises and whales.
The ship's owner accused the jailed captain of causing the wreck that left at least six dead and 29 missing, saying he made an "unapproved, unauthorized maneuver" to divert the vessel from its programmed course.
Earlier, authorities had said 16 people were missing. But an Italian Coast Guard official, Marco Brusco, said late Monday that 25 passengers and four crew members were unaccounted for three days after the Costa Concordia struck a reef and capsized off the coast of the tiny island of Giglio.

[Pelagic]

Putting this tragedy into legal perspectives:

We first have to determine if the Master was on the Bridge at the time of the incident and had officially relieved the Watch keeper of Bridge Command? (All Officer Watch keepers would normally hold captain’s License and are in command of navigation unless relieved)

If not, once the event happened, the Master is legally bound to send out a Mayday ASAP to avail of all possible assistance. Did he do this? (As did captain Haywood on the Exon Valdez)…..If not that is a crime.

As for leaving the ship early, if true and it was not because of injury, he has broken the primary responsibility to assist in saving every remaining soul on board his vessel.

Passing close to land is not unusual or a crime, but was it at a safe speed with the appropriate redundancy in navigation and monitoring to be considered a controlled maneuver?

In the Cruise ship industry passing close to populated areas or glaciers is great for marketing, provides photo ops, thrills the passengers and is free advertising.

In commercial shipping, masters are often called upon to do things that will help the companies’ bottom line, even if that goes against their training. If they don’t do it, the company will find a captain who will.

While the company does not officially sanction borderline commercial practices.. they encourage it within the captain’s discretion and this is where the captain failed to manage it properly and will be held legally responsible.