Cruise Ship Costa Concordia - MERGED THREADS

[St. Elsewhere]

Originally Posted by avb3

Maybe I am naive, but if it was in deeper water, would it not be easier to raise? If it is resting on rocks (as it is), how the heck are they going to get it to float?

If it was in deeper water, those air bladders get a chance to do their stuff, seems to me.

But then again, what do I know?

If it had sunk in water deeper than it did, much of the ship would have been submerged, and many more passengers would likely have drowned. The one bright spot in this disaster is that it settled to the bottom with many of the decks above water allowing time for people to evacuate in the darkness.

Also, getting rescue vessels to the site was delayed due to the lack of a timely Mayday call from Concordia.

[MacG]

There is a good article by the hand of correspondent John Hooper of The Guardian.
He metion some names of the unknown who managed to do something while Schettino and the mates abandoned the bridge.
Good reading for a change.

Costa Concordia shipwreck's hero and villain lay bare two souls of Italy | World news | guardian.co.uk

[chala]

Originally Posted by mackconsult

why did he jump ship ......

According to a translation of his altercation with the Coast Guard he was thrown overboard with others when the ship capsized.

[deckofficer]

I love that paddle wheeler at Tahoe, I live 45 miles away. What size diesels were you using and vessel speed? I'm curious to the hull and paddle efficiencies (or lack of). I've never been on any other cruise ship forum other than critic, and if say the members there tone down their cruise histories in their signatures, then those other forums must be a 3 ring circus of elaborate signatures.

[avb3]

Originally Posted by chala

According to a translation of his altercation with the Coast Guard he was thrown overboard with others when the ship capsized.

Sure, and if a frog had wings, it would fly.

[MacG]

@Bob

Open up a design thread, otherwise we sail off topic like Captn Schettino did.

A paddlewheeler served its purpose quite elegantly, equip it with steamengines, not diesels but if, use a central low rpm engine with a huge torque. Actually, regarding hull design they are flat bottom pontoons with a superstructure a la villa fantasia. Nevertheless a charming total that is set for jungle atmospheres.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Rakuflames

Darned if I know! At some point they lost power, and, presumably, steering. That's why I wonder if he gets the credit for safely parking it on the ledge ... that and he seems to have screwed up so many other things.

I don't think they lost either power or steering, because they certainly maneuvered onto that ledge. They didn't end up there accidentally.

Intentionally grounding the ship near land is SOP in such a situation. Because it is well known that you can't evacuate 4000 people from a vessel of that size if it sinks in less than many hours. As far as I understand the disaster plans for ships of that type all assume that you get the ship into port or firmly aground so that you have time to get all the people off. If it just sinks in the middle of the ocean, it is not possible to save everyone.

It seems to me that they did an outstanding job of getting the ship onto that ledge. They succeeded in creating a stable platform from which it was possible to get off 99% of the people safely. That is a great achievement, in my opinion, and despite the reports of chaos, the rescue operation itself must have gone very well to get to such a result.

If they had failed in that maneuver and the ship had sunk in deep water, or if the ship had gone over before the people were out, thousands of people would have died. Whether Schettino was managing or coordinating those maneuvers we don't know. Maybe he was in shock, staring out the bridge windows while some smart, energetic junior person took over. Or maybe not. I would bet that the story comes out over time.

As to cruise ships being death traps or not -- jeez, do you guys ever fly? How often do airliners crash? There is a certain calculated risk at doing anything other than sitting home and cowering in your armchair. Statistically those ships are extremely safe, safer than airliners which most of us do not hesitate boarding. There is a calculated risk, due to their size and the logistics of getting large numbers of people on and off of them, but it's a reasonable risk to take for the enormous pleasure of going to sea. The risk could be reduced by better controlling the "human factor", which seems to have bitten the Costa Concordia.

I don't see how anything could be done to make it possible to evacuate people any faster. But one thing which bothers me is that the flooding was so uncontrollable. I am surprised that hitting a rock would cause such catastrophic flooding in such a large vessel. I understand that the Titanic flooded because it scraped all the way along the iceberg, puncturing most of the watertight compartments, but what about the Costa Concordia? Why couldn't they seal off the leak? Perhaps this is a design flaw -- certainly, you would want such a vessel to be extremely resistant to flooding, since you need most of a day to get the passengers off in case of an accident, and God forbid in bad weather even longer.

[deckofficer]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Perhaps this is a design flaw -- certainly, you would want such a vessel to be extremely resistant to flooding, since you need most of a day to get the passengers off in case of an accident, and God forbid in bad weather even longer.

Not a design flaw, it is the design. I'll repeat, a cruise ship has the least positive stability of any commercial vessel even less than a RORO. Does not take much weight shift to capsize.

[chala]

Originally Posted by Astrid

If I remember correctly,

Also when setting a route it is possible to test the route. Testing Route leg 4 on the previous simulation come with a pop-up warning. In run mode there is an audible spoken alarm (dangerous depth area) then (you are running into Danger) and a red highlight of the dangers will appear on the screen together with a description of the alarms. There can be also other alarms (region, waypoint, Gps, sounder etc loss of com.). Many more interactions can be programmed like slowing down the ship. The radius of gyration can be programmed and the software will slow down the ship accordingly, this on a 12+ years old software. But of course if The Rocks are not on the chart they will not be highlited.

[MacG]

You make here the mistake to channel the ship through the two rocks of Le Scole. Such is not possible. And did not happen.
Concordia hit (as one presumes) the outerside of Le Scole. Not the inside.

[chala]

Originally Posted by avb3

Sure, and if a frog had wings, it would fly.

And they did, they where called "mirage". 03_big grin X 3

[chala]

Originally Posted by MacG

You make here the mistake to channel the ship through the two rocks of Le Scole. Such is not possible. And did not happen.
Concordia hit (as one presumes) the outerside of Le Scole. Not the inside.

It is not about where the ships it the rocks, nobody knows. It is about the use of "Nitendo's". 01_smile . By the way is your novel about the revival of Edmond Dantes?

[chala]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

I don't see how anything could be done to make it possible to evacuate people any faster. But one thing which bothers me is that the flooding was so uncontrollable. I am surprised that hitting a rock would cause such catastrophic flooding in such a large vessel.

If you look at one of the picture, you will see a long gash before and under the stabiliser, the gash seems to continue under the hull, it looks like there was more that just one rock.

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by Rakuflames

Darned if I know! At some point they lost power, and, presumably, steering. That's why I wonder if he gets the credit for safely parking it on the ledge ... that and he seems to have screwed up so many other things.

Theres no evidence they lost steering. The ship remained under power the whole time. When the initial accident occurred there was a very brief interruption of power to the lights etc.

Dave

[MacG]

There is no account of any technical manco. It no subject at all. Again, facts are on the table, fishing after motifs is not bringing any light. The reason for the change of course is known and the defense of the Captain worrisome.

Coastguard yesterday made a very clear statement about the Captain's actions.

Another point is that although Smit Salvage is on location they have not received any green light to commence offloading fueloil. That was something I wondered about but this morning it became clear that the Italians changed policy by declaring the area of Giglio as calamity zone. Now waiting for the oilspill to come.
A bad sign for the further disposal of the wreck. (this lline is for my account.)