Survivors tell of chaotic escapes after cruise ship runs aground off Italy

usna1985 said:
What they do in the USN and the USCG and what's done on cruise ships in emergencies is different. There's no question that 7 short and 1 long is the general alarm for cruise ships. That's beaten into your head at the safety drill and, when our ship hit another ship, that's exactly what we heard.

Remember that most cruise passengers are like sheep. A sound of this "magnitude" gets everyone's attention in a hurry.

It appears the alarm was sounded on the Costa ship -- however, probably later than it should have been. And, since there'd been no safety briefing. people were clueless.
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Haha, ok. I feel better. I thought I had missed a key part of my sea tour drills....

To tell you the truth I remember very little about the cruise I was on, except that I had fun, and we kinda, sorta cheated on a game. What a blast though!

Even if your job takes you to sea on a ship.... a cruise is very different.

"LITs you spend half of the year at sea, isn't a cruise like going back to work?"

NOPE! :biggrin:
 
sprog said:
scout...Europe is nice by cruise; it really is a nice way to travel there.
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Just hope you're not making a route through the North Atlantic...really rough seas. I couldn't fall asleep in my rack at all when we were making the trip from London to Reykjavik because Eagle would "see-saw" and I'd routinely get tossed out.
 
SamAca10 said:
Just hope you're not making a route through the North Atlantic...really rough seas. I couldn't fall asleep in my rack at all when we were making the trip from London to Reykjavik because Eagle would "see-saw" and I'd routinely get tossed out.
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While some cruises do offer TA voyages for repositioning purposes, the usual 7-14 day European cruises are offered from a Med. port like Barcelona. There are a couple of Baltic routes, too.

TA trips are usually a good deal, but you need the time off work to do it and, as you note, perhaps a heartier pair of sea legs.
 
SamAca10 said:
Just hope you're not making a route through the North Atlantic...really rough seas. I couldn't fall asleep in my rack at all when we were making the trip from London to Reykjavik because Eagle would "see-saw" and I'd routinely get tossed out.
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a 1000 ft. cruise ship with a serious draft and displacement feels much better than a 295 ft. old sailing ship.
 
try a 110' taking anything over 6 bow-on.

Also maybe that whistle is internal to the ship as opposed to an external whistle signal. You can't usually hear a ships whistle inside the skin of the ship so most people wouldn't hear it if it wasn't played over the ships PA system. There are other ways to alert other vessels that you are having an emergency as per COLREGS (red over red).
 
Never taken 6' on a 110'.... took 25' on a 210' though. Not the most comfortable ride, but obviously not as bad as a 110', yuck.
 
sprog said:
Was that Orient Beach on St. Martin (the French side)?

I went there on one of the trips, and some of the nude bathers...

Well, it just makes you realize that some people just don't care what others think..:yllol:
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Yup, Orient Beach. Nude beaches are definitely the habitué of those who have been greatly wronged by gravity and UV rays. We enjoyed it nonetheless.
 
usna1985 said:
It appears the alarm was sounded on the Costa ship -- however, probably later than it should have been.
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I would wait for the experts to analyze the information from the VDR (voyage data recorder) before I would speculate on that one.

usna1985 said:
And, since there'd been no safety briefing. people were clueless.
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Costa has a practice of allowing multiple embarkation ports but they only conduct the one SOLAS required fire and emergency drill per week. As I understand it there are other cruise lines that do the same thing. On a freighter (or even a passenger ship for that matter) if you have more than a 25% crew change out you have to conduct F&B drills within 24 hours after departure. There's no such requirement for drills that are tied to passenger turnover. My advice to anyone cruising is to be proactive and read over the safety card in your stateroom along with checking the location of your lifejacket and survival suit. Familiarize yourself with the emergency signals and where your muster area is and how to get to it in event of an emergency.

‘clueless people’ is one of the big reasons I never had the desire to work on a passenger ship. I didn’t want to work where the cargo could talk back to me…or possibly panic and ruin my day.:eek:
 
Costa is now acknowledging that the CO "may have made significant" errors."

"The route of the vessel appears to have been too close to the shore, and the captain's judgment in handling the emergency appears to have not followed standard Costa procedures," Costa Cruises said in a statement.

Yeah, I know the captain always takes the blame, but it also goes with the territory.

And, I must say that I give Costa credit for making the statement.
 
usna1985 said:
Costa is now acknowledging that the CO "may have made significant" errors."

"The route of the vessel appears to have been too close to the shore, and the captain's judgment in handling the emergency appears to have not followed standard Costa procedures," Costa Cruises said in a statement.

Yeah, I know the captain always takes the blame, but it also goes with the territory.

And, I must say that I give Costa credit for making the statement.
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Obviously the ‘old man’ and the ships ‘bridge team’ lost the bubble on this one.. I have heard of other cruise ships close hauling land so as to give the cliental a photo op. Which is what I think was happening in this case. Is it prudent? No. Is it something that’s done routinely. Yes. Is it something Costa or other cruise lines know about and tacitly approve of.. Probably yes. With all that said, the master should not expect any support for his actions from the Costa home office. They’ll be trying to distance themselves from those actions and limit their liability. I’m sure they’ll be claiming no ‘privity or knowledge ‘ that their ships probably routinely come closer to land than they should in order to give the passengers a more ‘scenic experience’. There’s a video floating around the internet that shows the same ship in almost the same location exactly one year earlier passing about 700 yards off the Giglio harbor entrance breakwater on her way up the islands coast.
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I’m curious what the ‘standard procedures’ in Costa’s SMS (safety management system) says about navigating in proximity to shoal waters. Does it define minimum distances off, minimum under keel clearances, or other restrictions. I’d also like to see the procedures dealing with a grounding causality and abandoning ship. [/FONT]
 
According to the timeline:

1900 Central European Time Costa Concordia departs Civitavecchia.

Approximately 2130 CET Costa Concordia strikes. Not a time conducive to photography? What is this waving to someone story?

2145 CET First alarm sounded and crew states electrical problem (harmonic conversion?). Not to worry just return to your rooms.

2150 CET Ship begins to list significantly.

2210 CET Abandon Ship Signal and passengers try to find lifeboats and directions to lifeboats and no one speaks english or french, german etc. Mass confusion.

2340 CET Reports of Captain leaving the vessel while passangers and crew still aboard and Captain found on shore. Told to return to ship by Coast Guard and refuses. Still up in the air but it looks like jail time.

0230 Some 300 passengers and crew stilll aboard the stricken vessel.

Monday 1/16/2012 Sixteen still missing including two american tourists.

Update: May be 29 passengers and four crew still missing
 
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Industry Analysts are estimating that the ship is a "Constructive Total Loss". Carnival Cruise has stated that "The vessel is expected to be out of service for the remainder of our current fiscal year if not longer". Got to love those corporate press releases.
 
AF6872 said:
According to the timeline:

1900 Central European Time Costa Concordia departs Civitavecchia.

Approximately 2130 CET Costa Concordia strikes. Not a time conducive to photography?
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Heck I don't know; maybe he was just bringing her in close so the evening diners could enjoy a backdrop of twinkling lights in the quaint Italian island village.. It's was still not a very prudent move regardless of intent.
 
deepdraft1 said:
Heck I don't know; maybe he was just bringing her in close so the evening diners could enjoy a backdrop of twinkling lights in the quaint Italian island village.. It's was still not a very prudent move regardless of intent.
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I doubt the passengers had a clue. The first night, especially, you're focusing on your table mates, the wait staff, the menu, etc. Quite honestly, you could care less if there were twinkling lights -- and most dining room patrons aren't anywhere near a window.

From what I've read (and it's only that), they were catering to the island locals, not the passengers. Regardless, not a good move.
 
Well, that didn't look too good.
Although, the guy ordering the captain to do his job didn't seem to be helping the situation a whole lot. He knew what had to be done, but he seemed like he was just yelling at the captain. A bit of calm (even artificial) tends to go a long way toward getting flustered people back in the swing of things.
 
raimius said:
Well, that didn't look too good.
Although, the guy ordering the captain to do his job didn't seem to be helping the situation a whole lot. He knew what had to be done, but he seemed like he was just yelling at the captain. A bit of calm (even artificial) tends to go a long way toward getting flustered people back in the swing of things.
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This is over an hour into it.... the captain seemed to be "checked out". Italians are yelling things all the time anyway. My friend's grandmother seems like she's yelling, but she isn't....imagine if there was video.... how much arm motioning there would be... :wink:
 
Part of my family is Italian, so yeah! :shake:

Maybe that's why the CG guy couldn't get the captain to act. The captain couldn't see his hands!
 
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