MrMoran Posted January 16, 2012 Share Posted January 16, 2012 What a muck up ! Trust the Italians Do you have to be racist? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alankearn Posted January 16, 2012 Share Posted January 16, 2012 I think these boats look top heavy to start with. It also surprises me that something this tall and heavy displaces only 26 feet of water. It must be the width (beam) of it that keeps it steady. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
junction1 Posted January 16, 2012 Share Posted January 16, 2012 It also surprises me that something this tall and heavy displaces only 26 feet of water. It must be the width (beam) of it that keeps it steady. Similar to canal boats that displace circa 2 feet I suppose. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GodStar Posted January 16, 2012 Share Posted January 16, 2012 It will be interesting to see what was going on here. Why were they sailing so close to shore, at what appears to be high speed is one question. Or were they manouevering close to shore, and lost control is another. Whatever, the cruise industry will take a hammer this summer if good answers are not forthcoming. Stick with P&O you can trust those boys. Ahhh P&O.. the ones that hiked their prices to take advantage of stranded folk after the icelandinc volcano shut the airports. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anna Glypta Posted January 16, 2012 Author Share Posted January 16, 2012 I think the most alarming thing I heard from the rescued passengers was they were due to have the ships safety drill the NEXT DAY. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anna Glypta Posted January 16, 2012 Author Share Posted January 16, 2012 What a muck up ! Trust the Italians Yes they mucked up big time in Vietnam as well. Oh hang on..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anarchon Posted January 16, 2012 Share Posted January 16, 2012 There are a few comparisons with the 1912 Titanic tragedy. Titanic - 14 April 1912: - Captain EJ Smith steams full speed ahead into a dense ice field in the mid North Atlantic despite having received several iceberg warnings over the previous 2 days (Captain Smith showboating with an eye on the Blue Riband perhaps?) - Iceberg punctures hull on starboard side. - Although Titanic has more than the legal minimum requirement for number of life boats and places (by 1912 standards), most life boats were not filled to capacity when launched. All lifeboats apart from the collapsable ones were launched successfully. Officers and crew undertook lifeboat lowerings in an orderly fashion (as opposed to Costa Concordia) - General panic on board only set in during the last 30 or so minutes of the sinking when people still onboard realised that most of lifeboats had been launched and the stern of the ship started to rise visibly out of the water. Things were relatively orderly for the first 2 hours or so. - Electrical systems and lighting were not lost until final half hour of sinking when water floods engine room - Titanic took 2 hours forty minutes to sink. She did not list and then capsize within an hour of impact. - Titanic had a draft of 34 feet, which meant along with her design she was much less prone to listing when taking in water - Nearby ships (SS Californian) ignored Titanic distress rockets and made no attempt to contact Titanic by wireless - 1,514 people lost their lives - Captain went down with his ship Lessons learnt from subsequent US Senate & British Board of Trade enquiries: - set up International Ice Patrol in the North Atlantic (still running today) - set minimum life boat standards - improved life jacket design - changes to hull construction standards - holding of mandatory ship safety drills (didn't appear to happen on the Costa Concordia - definately a lesson not learnt there!) - don't ignore maritime distress rockets (aimed in particular at Captain Lord - SS Californian) - make sure lookouts have binnoculars Costa Concordia - 13 January 2012 - Ship veers 3-4 miles off usual course and is holed below the waterline on a reef in shallow waters. (There are suggestions that the Captain was showboating infront of the town of Porto Giglio at the suggestion of it's mayor - hence why he came so close to the island) - electrical systems in the cabins fail shortly after initial collision contributing to utter chaos of people trying to find their way to the life boat stations (I suppose this is comparable with the plight of 3rd class Titanic passengers who could not access the boat deck and hence get to the life boats) - life boat drill appeared not to have taken place since the ship embarked on it's voyage (these didn't happen as routine in 1912 and was one of the subsequent recommendations) - most lifeboats on the starboard side could not be launched due to the 20 degree list caused by the sharp turn to port and subsequent grounding - Costa Concordia has a draft of 26 feet - not ideal for a ship taking in water on one side, however combined with stabilisers etc. should have minimised risk of severe list. The fatal error here was the attempted sharp turn into the Port of Giglio while it was listing. - Captain abandons ship (possibly even before most passangers had been taken off ?????) - so far 6 people confirmed dead I think the only other comparable events between the two disasters is the time it took to start lowering the life boats and the irresponsible decisions by their captains in the run-up to the initial collisions and the subsequent emergency management (i.e. Smith speeding through a confirmed ice field and Schettino steering too close to shallow water and rocks). In the case of the Titanic, the first life boat was apparently lowered around 45 minutes after the initial impact (collision at 23:40 - first life boat lowered at 00:25). I presume with all the hype of it being an 'unsinkable' ship, the Captain and officers were at first unsure whether the damage was fatal to the ship. The Titanic hull was sub divided into a series of 20 or so water tight compartments. If any 4 of the compartments were breached then the ship would still be able to stay afloat. Unfortunately, the iceberg breached 5 compartments as confirmed via a visual inpection by Thomas Andrews - ship designer who was also onboard the maiden voyage. In the case of the Costa Concordia, the Captain attempted to steer the ship via a sharp port turn into the harbour of Porto Giglio and by doing so caused the 20 degree list to starboard that eventually capsized and grounded the ship. The order to lower life boats here apparently came 45 minutes after the initial collision. The actions of both Smith and Schettino following the initial impacts suggests 'rabbits caught in headlight' syndrome. They didn't have a clue how to handle a serious emergency situation. In the case of Smith, he delegated most of the evacuation procedures to his officers (Murdoch and Lightoller in particular), who then went on to start evacuating the ship in an orderly and competent manner (at least for the first hour and a half or so). It looks like the Costa Concordia situation was more a case of 'everyone for themselves' at the moment. Interestingly, both ships are connected through their owners. Titanic was owned by the White Star Line, which subsequently merged with Cunard, which was subsequently bought by Carnival Corporation. The Costa Concordia is owned by Costa Cruises, which is ultimately owned by Carnival Corporation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grandad.Malky Posted January 16, 2012 Share Posted January 16, 2012 I think the most alarming thing I heard from the rescued passengers was they were due to have the ships safety drill the NEXT DAY. That’s what happened when we went on our first cruise last year …….. I bet they will be looking at that policy again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anna Glypta Posted January 16, 2012 Author Share Posted January 16, 2012 It seems like the Titanic there was a captain who was over confident and ignored the risks and a boat that wasn't saved by its watertight compartments when the hull was breached. It also seems that many folk had no life jackets, couldn't get into life boats, and even the safety drill hadn't been held and so passengers had no idea what they were supposed to do. The only saving grace here is it wasn't arctic waters and was close to land otherwise there would have been massive loss of life. I still cannot comprehend how with SONAR, SatNav, Radar etc etc a ship of this size can hit a rock and sink. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ANGELFIRE1 Posted January 16, 2012 Share Posted January 16, 2012 From a prior post, "The Titanic hull was sub divided into a series of 20 or so water tight compartments. If any 4 of the compartments were breached then the ship would still be able to stay afloat. Unfortunately, the iceberg breached 5 compartments as confirmed via a visual inpection by Thomas Andrews - ship designer who was also onboard the maiden voyage." I believe the main reason the Titanic sank was that the "compartments" did not extend fully to the roof, allowing the ingress of water once the hull was breached to fill one compartment to overflowing - into the next compartment - then into the next and so on resulting in the sheer weight of water pulling her under. Why do modern ships still sink when the hull is breached, they must now have completely watertight compartments surely. Maybe the Italian Captain made a mistake trying to turn to get her into harbour, the wash and weight of the water might have pulled her over. Why was the boat - 4 miles off course, I imagine that will take some explaining. Angel. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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