Italian cruise ship captain arrested for abandoning ship.

[carverman]

Anyone for a "3hr cruise" on the good ship Minnow....(Gilligan?)

Well it happened again..an Italian captain and crew abandoning a cruise ship
sinking like the Titanic with 4000 people aboard and only 50 lifeboats and
jackets. Captain and crew took some lifejackets for themselves and left
the passengers to fend for themselves.
http://news.yahoo.com/cruise-ship-ag...235744825.html

This happened previously in the the Oceanos incident in South Africa where..
"Captain Yiannis Avranas was accused by the passengers of leaving hundreds behind with no one other than the ship's onboard entertainers to help them evacuate. Avranas claimed that he left the ship first in order to arrange for a rescue effort, and then supervised the rescue effort from a helicopter. Avranas stated, "[B]When I give the order abandon ship, it doesn't matter what time I leave. Abandon is for everybody. If some people want to stay, they can stay."


Fly on the wall in sinking cruise ship Oceanos...(fly stayed with the sinking
ship, unlike the chicken captain!)

Firstmate: Capitano..I think we have made a serious mistake!
Captain Avranas: What?..why do you bother me when I am drinking my
bottle of $200 Italiano Chianti? You better have a good reason.
Firstmate" Capitano..we opened the waster water (toilet) valves by
accident at sea....and the water is coming in and flooding the hold.
Captain Avranas: So you can't plug the leak with a roll of toilet paper?
FM: No Capitano...it is impossible to stop leak and ship is starting to list
to one side.

Captain: Ok, give the order to abandon ship..wait..I'll take my half bottle
of this good wine to drink on the lifeboat..
FM: Lifeboat Capitano..isn't it a bit early to abandon ship? What about
helping the passengers get into the lifeboats?
Captain" Hell no..When I give the order to abandon ship..EVERYONE should
abandon ship..if they want to stay..they can stay..what can I do!
FM..so you are leaving then?
Captain: Yes, it is my duty to row out and call for help for a helicopter to
take me to port, so I can co-ordinate the rescue....
But I hate to leave my all my wine and pasta behind on a sinking ship..
please Guiseppi..take another life boat and load the captains wine and
pantry on it...Bella Bella...Caoi!

[mode3sour]

I thought the Captain is supposed to go down with the ship?

[Beaver101]

Not by Captain Avranass' rules book ... rule #1 captain abandon ship first. rule #2 it's every man or woman for him or herself when the captain says abandon ship!

Carve: you're hilarious! Thanks for the silent movie-script and laughs!

[uptoolate]

I don't think it was 'sinking like the Titanic' Carverman. On the Titanic, the captain and 80% of the male crew members were lost with the ship. Interestingly, 90% of the female crew members survived. Women's liberation apparently hadn't progressed back in the day.

[carverman]

I don't think it was 'sinking like the Titanic' Carverman. On the Titanic, the captain and 80% of the male crew members were lost with the ship. Interestingly, 90% of the female crew members survived. Women's liberation apparently hadn't progressed back in the day.

Back in the old days, when the call came from the captain to man the
lifeboats (not abandon ship), the women and children came first!
The "unsinkable" RMS Titanic..with over 3600 passengers aboard and
only 20 lifeboats was the utlimate maritime tragedy..because of man's
total stupidity when it comes to trusting something created by a bureacracy
of maritime engineers. He was responsible for the ship and failed in his
duty to ensure adequate lifeboats and avoiding icebergs. However,
he did the right thing to pay for his mistake and go down with the ship..
he didn't have much choice there!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Titanic

However..it seems that modern day sailing captains are just there for the money and preserving their own
lives first. It's a completely different set of rules..
Hitting a reef? What was the captain doing at the time? Recovering from the all nighter at a bar in Roma where he met these two ladies..and...well he didn't get much sleep after that..so he drinks a cup of wine for breakfast and staggers on board..with his white captains hat on crooked..

The BeachBoys had a song about that a long time ago..
We come on the cruise ship Concordia
My old grandfather and me
Around Roma town we did roam
Drinking that Italian wine all night
Got so sick, it's a fright
Well I feel so broken up
I just wannna go home

So sound the Concordia's sailing horn
Anyone checked out the rudder steering gear shorn
Call for the Captain still ashore.....
Oh...He just wants to go home?
Please let him go home..
Well I feel so sick now,
I just want a refund and go home

Well The first mate he's still drunk
And broke in the Cap'n's private wine trunk
And the wheelhouse was empty as everyone partied on
Gigilo island here we come...
The women will welcome us some
Whoops!...who's steering the ship?
The reef just came on the radar's blip!
Well too bad... the ship is so broke up..the Captain and I wanna go home

[Cal]

Yes, interesting story. I hope they figure out how the ship hit the reef, and what went wrong in regards to water level, course, emergency exit meeting and such...

[carverman]

Yes, interesting story. I hope they figure out how the ship hit the reef, and what went wrong in regards to water level, course, emergency exit meeting and such...

I would put my money on Human error somewhere before the crash or failsafe steering systems not being failsafe. The Captain and the First mate (first officer) are directly responsible under maritime law. Maybe there was problem with the reverse thrusters or the computerized navigation system had the wrong data entered in the course computer.
There probably wasn't a problem with the steering gear, otherwise he would have signaled a distress message back to port before he got to port.

A "couple years" ago, A BC Ferry, crashed headlong into the dock!
BC Ferries is notorious now... for crashing into the docks from time to time. Last one happened last month.

<extraction from online sources>
"ferry employee told CTV News there was a problem with the ship's reverse thrust, saying that the vessel lost pitch on its propeller when it was braking and the captain had no choice but to drop one of its anchors. <end>

The anchor didn't slow down the momemtum of that ferry, so it crashed headlong into the dock, crushing a lot of boats and sustaining lots of damage to the dock and itself.

Regardless of the cause of the accident, (and maritime accidents are frequent as we know these days), the Captain and crew should have stayed with the ship and assisted the passengers..instead of abandoning the sinking ship,
like the "rat that he was".
There were at least 5 lives lost and 15 more are still missing and unaccounted for in the partially submerged hull.
Capitano..no doubt, will probably spending some time in an Italian prison, after the lawsuits start!

<Fly on the wall in the bridge of the Concordia cruise ship>
Capitano?
Cap'n..si!
Female passenger: My grandson ..Mario Luigi wants to see the wheelhouse of our ship.
Capitano: si! come on in..I will be pleased to show you our course computer and how it drives the ship.. I only have to be here to "take over" if required to do so as we dock."

Female passenger: talking to captain ...NOT noticiing Mario likes pushing buttons on the computerized deck console....
Captano: still engaged in conversation with the female passenger..."my life's goal has always to be the finest captain on a cruise ship"...blah..blah..blah...
...NOT noticing the "course correction" now entered in error.. by the little boy pushing the buttons, and disengaging the initial auto pilot course setting entered at port.

Female passenger: Capitano..will we be disembarking soon?
Capitano...si!, I have set a course for IL........<Suddenly!..a Loud crunch is heard as the captain and passengers in the bridge are thrown off their feet!>..
Capitano: what the He*l!!!!.... "Mario Luigi!..when I catch up with you..YOU are going to "pay" for this!

[carverman]

Apparently, according to the news media, there are stll at least 15 passengers unaccounted for and the ship's keel is just on the edge of a 70 meter (230ft ) deep dropoff and abyss. Because the tides are shifting the ship towards the drop, further attempts to retrieve bodies have been abandoned for the safety of the divers. Another person rescued previously has died in hospital.

The Costa Concodia cruise ship was part of the largest cruise line in Italy and a subsidiary cruise line of Carnaval Cruises..who's stock has dropped 13% as a result of this accident.

The CEO of Costa Cruises blames it on Human error entirely, stating that the cruise ship was the most modern with all kind of safety provisions. This incident, he stated, was without precedence and exception to the cruise lines safety record
up to now. He mentioned also that the accident was entirely the captain's fault for deviating from the prescribed route!

[Dibs]

News reports have said that he faces up to 12 years in prison under Italian law for abandoning ship before the passengers. Unfortunately I can't find any primary sources on this.

[carverman]

News reports have said that he faces up to 12 years in prison under Italian law for abandoning ship before the passengers. Unfortunately I can't find any primary sources on this.

According to CBC interview with a former Cdn Naval Captain (retired), there was no excuse for the captain of a ship to abandon the ship and passengers, until all living passengers/crew were deemed to be off the sinking vessel safely.

Of course, in times of war (torpedo by enemy submarines) it is not always possible, and there have been incidents of rescue attempts of passenger ships undergoing great difficulty in the open seas with no other ships nearby to co-ordinate rescue efforts...but clearly the Concordia disaster cannot be considered a difficult case, because it happened so near to the shore of that Giglio island.

I think a fitting punishment for the captain is to tie cement blocks to his feet and dump him overboard at the same spot where he ran aground.