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Concordia News: Please Post Here

kingcruiser1

By kingcruiser1,
in Costa Cruises

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SomeBeach

SomeBeach

Posted
Posted

Pictures in link.

http://www.giglionews.it/2013020559439/news/isola-del-giglio/cassoni-e-piattaforme-in-partenza-per-lisola.html#comments

 

We publish the following four photos taken at the site of the Fincantieri Ancona where they were made ​​and seem ready to go in the direction of Isola del Giglio, the first side chests thrust that will be welded on the left side of the ship and allow the rotation and the buoyancy of the wreck . shots also add platforms 1, 2 and 3, two of which are already loaded on a barge in La Spezia to the island. The whole thing even if you still face delays drilling on the sea side for the installation of the platforms themselves. It would seem that a new platform, similar to Micoperi 30, could get to Giglio to speed up drilling immediately acting on the perforations that do not present difficulties of bottom.

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clive and anne

clive and anne

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Thanks for that Micki.

It would seem that four of the caissons are ready to be sent to Giglio.

The report also mentions that another huge crane barge is on its way to the island to speed up the drilling for the underwater platforms. Maybe if we knew its name we could track it on AIS.

I also noticed that the platforms on the barges are not just flat but have an angled structure coming up from the bed of the platform. Could this be one of the safeguards to stop the ship rolling on from upright and off the platforms that Tonka was asking a couple of weeks ago??

 

Clive

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Tonka's Skipper

Tonka's Skipper

Posted
Posted
Thanks for that Micki.

It would seem that four of the caissons are ready to be sent to Giglio.

The report also mentions that another huge crane barge is on its way to the island to speed up the drilling for the underwater platforms. Maybe if we knew its name we could track it on AIS.

I also noticed that the platforms on the barges are not just flat but have an angled structure coming up from the bed of the platform. Could this be one of the safeguards to stop the ship rolling on from upright and off the platforms that Tonka was asking a couple of weeks ago??

 

Clive

 

 

Hi Clive,

 

 

I believe those raised/angled structures on the plaforms are there to angle the wires when pulling her upright. I also think they would stop the hull rorm sliding off the platform.

 

AKK

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clive and anne

clive and anne

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Just been trawling thru the weekly progress report that Micki sent us a few days ago to try and find some clues as to this other vessel on its way to assist Micoperi 30. There are two vessels that appear around the text for Micoperi 30 . The first one is Navalmare 1 & 2 and the other vessel is Malaviya 20.

I cant trace where the last one is at the moment (help) but Navalmare could be the barge which we have seen for some time on the starboard/ top of Concordia.

Would love to hear what everyone helps thinks.

 

Clive

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SomeBeach

SomeBeach

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Posted (edited)

Please share this article with others using the link below.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/f707bb7c-71eb-11e2-886e-00144feab49a.html#ixzz2KKl3PrPP

 

 

The insurer Catlin has criticised Italian authorities for insisting the wreck of the Costa Concordia be removed in one piece, a complex operation that has pushed up its expected costs of the disaster by almost half.

Speaking as Catlin missed annual earnings expectations, Paul Jardine, chief operating officer, warned the bigger than expected expenses threatened to increase insurance premiums for other cruise ship owners.

The underwriter, which operates one of the biggest syndicates at the Lloyd’s of London market, cautioned on Friday the Costa disaster would cost it $51m, up from an earlier estimate of $35m.

Italian officials said last month more time and resources were required to remove the wreck of the cruise liner, which hit rocks off Tuscany more than a year ago.

Italian authorities have proposed building an underwater platform as part of efforts to minimise risks of further pollution to the surrounding conservation area. However, Mr Jardine suggested the plan was unnecessarily complex.

“The Italian government isn’t paying for it. It’s the ship owners and insurers who are picking up the tab . . . There’s a degree of frustration.”

Edited by SomeBeach
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SomeBeach

SomeBeach

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Posted
The webcam at Giglio is showing some more hardware that appears to be arriving.

It may be the equipment to help with the drilling. It has been to the right of the picture and has been there fo a few hours now.

 

I wondered if that was the Voe Earl that has the cranes referenced in my last post.

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clive and anne

clive and anne

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The ship I saw arriving yesterday appears to have positioned itself at the stern on the port side,you can see 2 "towers" which I presume are for the drilling work. Micoperi 30 has pulled back ,I guesss to allow the new vessell to get into position.

Not sure it is the Voe Earl Micki as it looks like the vessel has a traditional bow, unless Voe Earl is part of the new vessel which did appear to be an odd shape from the little I could see on the webcam.

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CostaSmurfette

CostaSmurfette

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A little something to read....a first hand account of the night by a honeymooning couple...they have written a book about there experience too, a cathartic way of dealing with what happened.

 

You'll notice that they describe something quite typical in human behaviour...that of a few who started to panic and push which began to spread initially but then calmed down to a sense of resignation...even a certain amount of banter and good humour whilst weighing up their fates...

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2013/feb/09/we-honeymooned-on-the-costa-concordia

 

 

 

 

 

Experience: we honeymooned on the Costa Concordia

 

It was 9.45pm on a Sunday evening and my wife, Emily, and I were relaxing in our cabin on the Italian cruise ship Costa Concordia. We'd married two weeks earlier and this was our honeymoon: 17 days cruising around Europe.

 

At first we thought nothing of the soft scratching noise, although later we'd realise it was the sound of the hull being ripped open by a rock. Moments after, we felt the ship tilt ever so slightly to the starboard side.

 

A wine bottle inched across the table and toppled off, then all our papers flew off the desk. We decided to walk up to the emergency meeting point, on the fourth deck, to see what was happening. We grabbed our life jackets from the cupboard. Still, we weren't really worried. We figured it was a drill and we'd be back in our cabin a few minutes later.

 

When we got there, a large crowd had already gathered. Crew members were trying to keep everyone calm, but it was clear they had no idea what was going on either.

 

Forty-five minutes later, the captain ordered us to abandon ship. People started pushing towards the lifeboats, hysterical mothers clutching babies, elderly couples rooted to the spot with fear. The crowd was becoming panicked, aggressive. Emily grabbed my arm. "I don't want to push," she told me. "Is that OK?"

 

"Yes," I replied.

 

"You know we might die, right?"

 

I nodded. It just didn't feel right to shove someone else out of the way to save our own lives.

 

Somehow we managed to find our way on to one of the last lifeboats but the ship was by then at such an angle that when the crew tried to lower it into the water, it just slammed against the side. After a few tries they gave up and hoisted us back up on deck.

 

The screaming had stopped now and an eerie calm had descended over the several hundred remaining passengers. We felt we'd been left to die. The ship was by now almost on its side and we could feel it being sucked downwards, water rushing in. Inevitably my mind flashed back to the movie Titanic. "We have to climb over the railing, on to the underside of the ship," I told Emily.

 

We found a length of rope and used it to lower ourselves. We instructed the passengers behind us to do the same. Then we all sat there, about 130 of us, and waited. "We should say goodbye to each other now," Emily said, "in case we don't get a chance later." We kissed and said we loved each other. Then I sang her a song I'd made up. "I'm glad we got married before this trip," Emily said.

 

It was sad, and surreal, but somehow we were smiling, too; we were just so grateful to be together. An hour or so later, we realised the ship had stopped sinking. It had tipped so far over, it was like we were sitting on a gentle slope.

 

There was an air of resignation and a strange sense of camaraderie as we sat with the other passengers, holding hands and hugging each other, talking, laughing, crying and telling silly jokes. "I never imagined this was how I would die," Emily said. At least it was an interesting way to go, we reasoned.

 

Finally, three hours later, one of the lifeboats returned. We clambered in, terrified, exhausted, but elated to be alive.

 

It dropped us on the tiny nearby island of Giglio, where 4,000 of our fellow passengers would eventually end up, too. After a sleepless night we were transported, via ferry and bus, back to Rome. We had no money or documents, and only the clothes we were standing in.

 

It was a couple of days before we finally arrived home. We were tired and traumatised. I found that writing helped me work through it, and I published a memoir.

 

For many months after the shipwreck, we struggled. The news was full of reports of the disaster, so we could never switch off. We swung between gratitude for surviving to crippling guilt that 32 other people hadn't. Day-to-day life seemed so trivial for both of us – we found it hard to sleep or concentrate on friends and work. It was frustrating when some friends remarked that surviving the wreck was "a cool story to tell the kids". Emily and I went to counselling together, and it helped that we understood what the other had gone through. If just one of us had experienced this, we agreed, our marriage may well not have made it.

 

• As told to Jacqui Paterson

 

The experiences described above almost match those of pax aboard Pacifica who were aboard Concordia and who were sailing the route again to assist in their healing from that night. The pax aboard Pacifica were all Europeans bar one Canadian couple. All quite level headed, all showing a remarkable level of forgiveness to Captain Schettino and his bridge crew that night.....one couple I actually knew from a previous cruise in 2010.

 

Like many on Pacifica told me, feeling angst against a fellow human being will eat you alive if you let it...by moving on with life and dealing with what happened in their own way...whether it by continuing to cruise, writing a book or however they choose to heal...they don't all hold Captain Schettino as a villain but as a man who simply became afraid of a situation he had no control over (and by that, they meant the aftermath, not the reasons why they got there in the first place).

 

Life is short...too short to hold a grudge and certainly too short to lose the ability to live life to the fullest.

Edited by CostaSmurfette
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Tonka's Skipper

Tonka's Skipper

Posted
Posted
The ship I saw arriving yesterday appears to have positioned itself at the stern on the port side,you can see 2 "towers" which I presume are for the drilling work. Micoperi 30 has pulled back ,I guesss to allow the new vessell to get into position.

Not sure it is the Voe Earl Micki as it looks like the vessel has a traditional bow, unless Voe Earl is part of the new vessel which did appear to be an odd shape from the little I could see on the webcam.

 

 

Those 2 towers are electro-hydualic cranes, with a safe working load of anywhere from about 30 metric tons to over a 100 metric tons.

 

AKK

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clive and anne

clive and anne

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Thanks AKK

I notice that Micoperi 30 is still away from the wreck and I thought noticed that the "hooks" on the static crane moving, havent seen that before, Wonder if its getting ready for the caissons to arrive.

Do we have a name for the new vessel. SB thought it might be Voe Earl but that looks like a flat barge whereas this one appears to have a conventional bow.

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watertheodds

watertheodds

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Posted

http://www.cruiselawnews.com/2013/02/articles/sinking/another-judge-dismisses-costa-concordia-lawsuit-filed-in-florida/

 

Posted on February 8, 2013 by Jim Walker

COSTA-BRAND(1).jpgLast September Carnival won its first battle arising out of the January 2012 Costa Concordia disaster when U.S. District Court judge Robin Rosenbaum held that the lawsuits against Carnival should be filed in Italy.

In that case, a thousand businesses on the island of Giglio where the Concordia cruise ship ran aground near the harbor tried to sue Carnival in Florida because it is the parent company for Costa which is based in Genoa, Italy.

Yesterday another District Court judge dismissed a lawsuit by cruise passengers against Carnival. Federal Judge William Dimitrouleas held that the passengers' lawsuit should be filed in Italy.

The ruling was expected from my point of view. The case involves an Italian cruise ship, operated by a company based in Italy, flying an Italian flag, captained by an Italian officer, which crashed in Italian waters and is being investigated by the Italian authorities.

The case was filed on behalf of Massachusetts residents Adrian, Amanda and Brian Warrick and their parents, Wilhelmina and Ceilito Warrick.

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SomeBeach

SomeBeach

Posted
Posted

CS, for those of us that have read the book "Abandoned Ship" by Benji Smith, I can tell you that he and his wife Emily were angry at not only the Captain but also Costa, possibly Carnival, some people on Giglio that they felt were ripping off the survivors (with some costs of items in their stores,) the American Embassy, along with the Chinese one (his wife needed that one,) personel trying to move them along from island to hotel, some tv and/or print folks, store clerks that wouldn't give them discounts, and our US Congress. I don't recall reading that he "forgave" the Captain tho he did offer thanks to crew that did try to help them.

Still, I would recommend you get and read the whole book as it is a very good acccount of what they went through. The book was released around the first anniversary of the disaster. I'm sure he was helped greatly in writing their story, as was Emily with her music for her album.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Whatare, with the way the contracts are written, I'm not surprised either.

Not being a lawyer nor wishing to play one here, I wonder if Costa would have to be found guilty of negligence and whether as the parent company Carnival could then be held for the same and would that then be a game changer in lawsuits. :confused:

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Mike.Minh

Mike.Minh

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Posted

More info on the heavy lifting ship on the ship owner's website, including a video from the time it was built in 2010. Built and based in/very close to my home town of Hamburg, ehem :)

 

http://sal-heavylift.com/eng/fleet/183/

 

See also the picture gallery for some close up photos on board of MV Svenja on the right hand side, I ref'd three examples from that page:

 

type183_3.jpg

 

type183_7.jpg

 

type183_16.jpg

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