Giglio Island (Italy): Fire brigade divers
found a body inside a stricken Italian cruise ship on Tuesday,
bringing the official death toll to 16 as salvage crews
prepared to pump 2,380 tonnes of fuel from its tanks.
The body was found on the third deck where some of the
114,500-tonne vessel's lifeboats were located, with rescuers
declining to give further details.
Emergency workers had pulled the bodies of two women from
the wreck yesterday, saying that they were found near the
luxury liner's Internet cafe.
Italian Maria D'Introno, 30, identified late yesterday,
was on the cruise with her husband and in-laws, who were
celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary, and they were just
settling down for dinner when the accident happened.
Too scared to throw herself into the sea along with the
others despite having a life jacket, D'Introno stayed on the
sinking ship as it keeled over after running aground on
January 13.
Other victims include Hungarian Sandor Feher, 42, who
helped children into a lifeboat before heading back towards
his cabin to get his violin, and Frenchman Francis Servel, 71,
who gave his wife his lifejacket. She survived.
Crews from Dutch company Smit Salvage on the Tuscan
island of Giglio meanwhile were looking for the best way to
access the Costa Concordia's 23 fuel tanks before syphoning
the oil out of the ship beached on the rocky shoreline.
"The company's divers will carry out underwater
operations which will probably take two days," said Claudio
Chiavacci, who is coordinating joint operations by salvage
workers and rescuers searching for missing people.
The Costa Concordia went down on January 13 with 4,229
people on board. It emerged today that Italian prosecutors
were looking into the cruise ship operator's possible role in
the wreck and reports of a chaotic evacuation.
"The employer is the guarantor and is responsible. We
have to look at the choices made by the operator," Beniamino
Deidda, chief prosecutor for the region where the disaster
occurred, was quoted by Italian media as saying.
"For now the attention has been on the fault of the
captain, who turned out to be tragically incompetent. But who
chooses the captain?" Deidda said.
Captain Francesco Schettino is under house arrest,
accused of manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning
ship.
PTI
First Published: Tuesday, January 24, 2012, 23:36