Cruise Ship Costa Concordia - MERGED THREADS

[David M]

At least that ship would be easier to salvage.

[hellosailor]

Chala, how come you keepmentioning the Lusitania, when that was an accident caused by political intigues, lies, brinksmanship, and baiting a combatant?

There was nothing "functional" about that disaster, it was all politics. The Germans said they'd sink any ship carrying munitions, the longshoreman who loaded them and the published cargo manifests showed they were being carried, and the US officially said there were no munitions, allowing an excuse to enter WW1 with "righteous indignation".

How do you get that parallelling this situation? Some disgruntled octogenarian Nazis got pissed off about Italy surrendering in WW2, and now they moved the rock during the last moonless night, in order to impale an Italian cruise liner? (Hey, every incident needs a good conspiracy theory. I've got the scriptwriters working on it now, and the Enquirer and Daily Mail have both placed bids to carry it first.)

http://www.smh.com.au/travel/travel-...122-1qbvk.html
I find the alleged offering of a 30% future discount by Costa to be outright bizarre, if not niggardly. If they want to follow conventional advice (apologize fast, and fewer people sue you) they should have been offering a refund plus a complimentary cruise--not a 30% discounted one. And of course, full reimbursement for all incidental losses, including new clothing, cameras, whatever, without arguing about documentation. But a refund plus 30% off just falls under "What were they thinking?!"

I also look askance at the translations being issued. When one says the ship hit a stone--that tells me immeidately that translation must be questioned. In US YnGlitch there is a difference between a rock and a stone. One hits a rock, not a stone, meaning the translator may be making other subtle errors. Functional, yes. Precise, no. One might have a rock, stone, or pebble in their shoe, perhaps they mistook "shoe" for "ship" as well. Or perhaps in British English the usage differs?

Time will tell.

[Silverado6x6]

Originally Posted by hellosailor

Chala, how come you keepmentioning the Lusitania, when that was an accident caused by political intigues, lies, brinksmanship, and baiting a combatant?

There was nothing "functional" about that disaster, it was all politics. The Germans said they'd sink any ship carrying munitions, the longshoreman who loaded them and the published cargo manifests showed they were being carried, and the US officially said there were no munitions, allowing an excuse to enter WW1 with "righteous indignation".

How do you get that parallelling this situation? Some disgruntled octogenarian Nazis got pissed off about Italy surrendering in WW2, and now they moved the rock during the last moonless night, in order to impale an Italian cruise liner? (Hey, every incident needs a good conspiracy theory. I've got the scriptwriters working on it now.)

Some years ago a shipyard in the UK was ordered to build a "plug" for a Costa ship, that is where they take a ship and cut it apart, spread the two sections apart and then slide the new matching plug in effectively making a longer ship with more cabins.

I happened upon an article a couple of days ago that after that plug was built Costa then refused to pay for it, the lug is essentially useless as it was custom built for one ship only, and the Brits were furious, if I can I will try to find the article again but I believe the shipyard lost so much money it collapsed financially. Costa turned the ship around and claimed that the UK yards standards were not good enough for them.

Now just for snits and giggles for the tinfoil cap crowd what if the charts or some other navaid was "changed" by someone to exact revenge upon Costa?

Don't call me a conspiracy theorist yet....

[Silverado6x6]

Costa Classica - The Ship That Broke the Cammell's Back - May 27, 2006

Costa Classica, the ship that broke the Cammell's back.



Built at the Cammel yard, Costa Classic turns around and refuses it, the yard folds. Costa eventually awarded the case.

[hellosailor]

There you go, the British shipyard was a subsidiary of Rolls, which of course was bought by the Germans, which brings back the irritation over the Italian surrender in WW2. Or so MI-6 (who are still po'd at Rolls being a German mark now) would have you believe. Which brings us neatly in line with Chala's allegation, that it is indeed all caused by the same folks (governments) that brought on the Lusitania. Allied-Axis fingerpointing. I don't understand how Papa Joe Kennedy and the mob fit into that picture though, must be something about the mafia and the source of the booze carried on the ship too, huh?

Perhaps they could simply secure it in place, and call it the "Trawler of Pisa" ?

[nigel1]

Originally Posted by ChannelIslander

Nigel, I very much enjoy hearing you share your knowledge about how large ships work. Thanks!

I'd like to know more about how you couple and uncouple engines onto a single drive shaft . . . ?

Off topic, but I was asked-
Pair of engines side by side.
Astern of them a gear box. Simply put, gear box with two big drive cogs with shafts going forward towards the engine.
Between the two big cogs, another cog connected to the propellor shaft.
Output shafts from the engines align with each shaft from the big cogs in the gear box. Between the engine output shaft and the gear box input shafts is a hydraulic operated friction clutch. Between clutch and engine shaft is a "Vulcan" coupling (basically part of the shaft is made of rubber to absorb the torque when clutching in, or ramping up the load
Engine started and run up to 800rpm, One engine is then clutched in, and the prop shaft will now turn. Prop is variable pitch, so make sure pitch at zero before clutching in.
If more power to the shaft is needed, start second engine and clutch in.
Engines are controlled by electronic governors and a Power Management system designed to keep loads in check. As the gear box also drives a generator, there is a limit to how much load can put on the engine/s.
Either it will prevent heavy consumers from starting, or, if lots of equipment is on the board, and for example all thrusters were set to maximum, the PMS would pull pack the propeller pitch, thus reducing the load on the engines.

[Silverado6x6]

I wonder if any British ships lost a rock recently?

I have a friend who is an author and I would love to give him a decent conspiracy storyline about a British plan to strike back at a foreign shipping company for causing the loss of of over 60 million euro, the loss of a shipyard and the loss of jobs.

They obtain access to the Admiralty charts and the navaid equipment upon a very new cruise vessel that has periodically been buzzing an Italian coastline to drum up business. Included is a sexy temptress that drugs the captain when he takes manual control of the ship.

Look folks, I'm nearly retired and I want to try my hand at novels myself.

[nigel1]

Originally Posted by Silverado6x6

Costa Classica - The Ship That Broke the Cammell's Back - May 27, 2006

Costa Classica, the ship that broke the Cammell's back.

On a more positive note, Cammell Laird ship yard is back in business, which is a good thing as knowing the right people there gets you bargain priced anti foul paint.

[SaucySailoress]

Industry insiders argue that the Carnival empire has the economic clout to carry out new building within its own group. It has the resources to ditch the deal with Cammell Laird and go through costly and lengthy arbitration.

Read more: Cammell left high and dry | In-depth | The Engineer
5 April 2001

Being a Liverpool lass myself, I'd say that the financial ruination Costa is facing is well-deserved.

But that's no consolation for the bereaved families.

[Erik C]

Originally Posted by SaucySailoress

Being a Liverpool lass myself, I'd say that the financial ruination Costa is facing is well-deserved.

But that's no consolation for the bereaved families.

I'm not so sure about that. The insurance money will come in handy in these difficult times. I very much doubt that any company would be so ruthless though.

[Silverado6x6]

I have a friend that built his own steel schooner and he is an author, his latest book is about the sea, an ex military sniper, dames in distress on the high seas, his next one will involve sex slave trades up around Ireland, I just sent him some loose ideas about a cruise ship transporting kidnapped women tourists, how the hero gets involved with a group wanting to exact revenge upon a cruise line that cause their lively hood and jobs to die off, etc and etc, just something of some modern day spice, arrogance on the high seas of powerful companies.

BTW his name is Matt Bracken. His books are at Amazon and Kindle.

[St. Elsewhere]

SMITT has started the process of removing the fuel on board Concordia. Containment booms are appearing around the vessel, and a ship to hold removed fuel is expected to arrive at the site today.

Debris including floating furniture is being removed from the ship, and the search for the remaining passengers will continue. Authorities believe that Concordia is currently stable.

Here is more of the story: Officials keen to remove Concordia fuel

[St. Elsewhere]

National Post has this graphic that illustrates the grounding and subsequent motion and listing of the Concordia. It is very detailed, and complete, but it is 6.3 MB to download.

http://nationalpostnews.files.wordpr...cruisesink.pdf

[HappySeagull]

Originally Posted by nigel1

Not necessary to have seperate gensets for thrusters. I have 2 x 1200HP bow thrustes and 2 x 700HP stern thrusters.
All these are driven off two shaft generators on the engine side of the gear boxes
Each shaft geny powers 1 x BT and 1 x ST plus domestics etc
At sea, with main engines running, all our power is off the shaft geny's, diesel genys only used in port.
We have 4 main engines, I can run with anywhere between 1 and 4 engines in use. Engines are arranged in pairs, so we can have either 1 or 2 engines coupled up to a prop shaft (two shafts).
If I'm towing something like a deep water rig, will run with 4 main engines, same for deep water anchor handling, for normal operations, 2 engines will suffice-

I have only been on one ship with a seperate gen set for a bow thruster, and that was a 250,000 tonne tanker which had a bow thruster retrofitted

then they must have had power at one engine at least.I've been perusing
Costa Concordia: the inside story of the night of Friday, January 13 - Telegraph

and I see this from the Daily Telegraph:
"Asleep in his cabin at the back of Deck 3 when the Costa Concordia crashed, Andrea Carollo, leapt out of bed and dressed.
By the time he opened his door water was already rushing down the corridor, and when he went to his post in the engine room the engines were beginning to flood.
“Within 15 minutes, the engine room told the bridge that there was nothing to be done,” he said. “The situation was beyond repair.” "

[HappySeagull]

Originally Posted by St. Elsewhere

National Post has this graphic that illustrates the grounding and subsequent motion and listing of the Concordia. It is very detailed, and complete, but it is 6.3 MB to download.

http://nationalpostnews.files.wordpr...cruisesink.pdf

I found that interesting page too, here:
The Costa Concordia's final moments | News | National Post