Survivors and bodies found aboard stricken cruise ship
Two more bodies have been found on the Costa Concordia wreck, after three survivors had been found earlier today.
A South Korean honeymoon couple and an injured crewman were taken from the liner today as rescuers continued to search the rest of the vessel.
At least five people are now known to have died when the liner keeled over off in the dark of Friday night after running aground. Today the bodies of an elderly couple were discovered in the parts of the submerged hull. At least 15 other people are still missing.
The vessel was carrying more than 4,000 people when it crashed.
The task of searching the vessel is made doubly difficult as it is lying almost entirely on its side and is partly submerged in freezing water. Teams of divers are combing the liner.
The crewman Manrico Gianpetroni had a broken leg and was trapped in the lower decks. He was air lifted to hospital.
“I never lost hope of being saved,” he said. “It was a 36-hour nightmare.”
During the night the rescue teams found two South Koreans still alive in their cabins and brought them ashore unharmed.
Previous 'flybys'
This is not the first time it appears the Concordia has sailed close to the island of Giglio before. According to a translated letter posted on the GiglioNews website, the vessel performed a "special flyby" in August 2011 in front of the port.
According to a letter written by the Mayor Sergio Ortelli, during this fly by it passed in slow motion in front of the port, with its lights all lit and sounded a greeting to the tourists on the island.
The website also shows a reply in which the captain thanks the Mayor and says how he could see "thousands of flashes" from cameras taking pictures of his ship from the port.
The website is currently unavailable but a cached copy is available here.
Meanwhile the captain of the luxury 114,500-tonne ship, Francesco Schettino, was under arrest and accused of manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning ship, Italian police said.
In a television interview, Schettino said the rock the vessel struck was not marked on any maritime charts of the area.
He said:
“What happened is that while we were moving with a tourist navigation system, as you can see by the rip (in the ship) there was a lateral rock projection. Even though we were sailing along the coast with the tourist navigation system, I firmly believe that the rocks were not detected as the ship was not heading forward but sideways as if underwater there was this rock projection.
“I don’t know if it was detected or not but on the nautical chart it was marked just as water at some 100-150 meters from the rocks and we were about 300 meters from the shore, more or less. We shouldn’t have had this contact.”
Passengers, comparing the disaster to the movie “Titanic”, told of people leaping into the sea and fighting over lifejackets in panic when the ship hit a rock and ran aground near the island of Giglio, late on Friday.
Two French tourists and a Peruvian crew member were known to have died. There was confusion about the number of people still unaccounted for. The president of the Tuscan region said the number stood at 17 but other estimates were as high as 34.
State prosecutor Francesco Verusio said investigations might go beyond the captain.
“We are investigating the possible responsibility of other people who could be responsible for such a dangerous manoeuvre,” he told SkyTG24 television. “The command systems did not function as they should have.”
