Taking The Rap.
Monday, January 23rd, 2012Probably the award for the person who will have the most difficult job talking his way out of what he has done this week, goes to a Captain Francesco Schettino the then Captain of the Costa Concordia who for whatever reason , wrote off his employers rather expensive luxury cruise ship.. ( valued at almost at half a billion US Dollars) .
This 114,500 ton floating palace with it’s 13 decks, 1500 cabins , and countless attractions for the super rich, is now lying worthless on the seafloor , ( or at least on rocks) as an eye saw to the many people of the area off the Italian coast … still coming to grips with the tragedy.
There will be claims and counter claims in the high courts around the world, Insurance Companies suing and counter suing ….lawyers trying to glean financial advantage for their clients ( and themselves).
But interestingly just days after this global catastrophe …..it is for most parts off the news radar. Hope for the few remaining passengers unaccounted for has now faded, and for most the months, if not years , of preventing an ecological disaster and the eventual salvaging for scrape of this monolith , will hold little interest for most people.
Taking the rap. ….Well did he or didn’t he. The Captain I mean.
Was he trying to show off to the Retired Admiral on shore, or to the Family of his Head Chef? Was he trying to impress the young lady who dined at his table, and who ( maybe) had accompanied him to the bridge that night?. This is the stuff of a Romantic Best Seller…even a Block Buster Motion Picture….
Was it a 4 and a half minute passionate kiss with his eyes closed and the other crew who were overseeing the steering all looking at their feet for the same amount of time ….that allowed the ship to be less than 150 metres from the shore, hit rocks and partially sink.
All these elements pose many unanswered questions, but without doubt all will be revealed in the course of time.
I personally blame technology.
Sea Farers of great cruise liners of the past had huge wheels to steer their ships. Five fully 6 foot rotations on the wheel to make a one degree difference in the route the ship sails.
Today you have a little three inch stick….almost like an X Box game control stick….and that folks is all that prevents you from doing a rather large oppsy as happened to The Costa C.
But before all you Cruise lovers cancel your bookings to buy a spar bath, Cruise Liners of today have some of the most sophisticated controls and backup systems in order to help prevent disasters of what happened to Captain Francesco and his ship.
Help does not give however immunity from stupidity.!
Fortunately there was not a higher loss of life. The Titanic sunk in April 1912 with the loss of 1523 lives. Two years later also in the Atlantic , the Empress of Ireland sunk in May 1914 with 1012 lives lost.
But the largest loss of lives goes to more recent times (1987 ) when the Dona Paz sunk of the Philippines with a numb chilling 4,375 people drowned.
The Doña Paz was built in 1963 , it had a passenger capacity of 608 people.[
On December 20, 1987, at 0630H, Philippine Standard Time, the Doña Paz disembarked from Tacloban City,Leyte, for the Philippine capital of Manila,near Marinduque. A survivor later said that the weather at sea that night was clear, but the sea was choppy[ While most of the passengers slept, the Doña Paz collided with MT Vector, an oil tanker en route from Bataan to Masbate. The Vector was carrying 8,800 barrels of gasoline and other petroleum products owned by Caltex Philippines
Upon the collision, the Vector's cargo ignited and caused a fire that spread onto the Doña Paz. Survivors recalled sensing the crash and an explosion, causing panic on the vessel.] Both ships sank in about 545 meters of water in the shark-infested Tablas Strait
It reportedly took eight hours before Philippine maritime authorities learned of the accident, and another eight hours to organize search and rescue operations.
Twenty-six survivors were retrieved from the seas. Twenty-four of them were passengers on the Doña Paz while the other two were crew members of the Vector.]None of the crew of the Doña Paz survived. Most of the survivors sustained burns from jumping into the flaming waters.
According to the initial announcement made by Sulpicio Lines, the official passenger manifest of the Doña Paz recorded 1,493 passengers and 60 crew members aboard.] According to Sulpicio Lines, the ferry was able to carry 1,424 passengers. A revised manifest released on December 23, 1987, showed 1,583 passengers and 58 crew members on the Doña Paz, with 675 persons boarding the ferry in Tacloban City, and 908 coming on board in Catbalogan City.] However, an anonymous official of Sulpicio Lines told UPI that extra tickets were usually purchased illegally aboard the ship at a cheaper rate, and those passengers were not listed on the manifest.] The same official added that holders of complimentary tickets and non-paying children below the age of four were likewise not listed on the manifest.
Survivors claimed that it was possible that the Doña Paz may have carried as many as 3,000 to 4,000 passengers. They took as signs that the ferry was overcrowded the fact that passengers were sleeping along corridors or on cots with three or four persons on them.Of the 21 bodies that had been identified five days after the accident, only one of the fatalities was listed on the official manifest
Time magazine called the accident the deadliest peace-time maritime disaster of the 20th century.Given the estimated death toll, the sinking of the Doña Paz has been called the world’s deadliest peacetime sea tragedy.Philippine President Corazon Aquino described the accident as “a national tragedy of harrowing proportions…[the Filipino people's] sadness is all the more painful because the tragedy struck with the approach of Christmas”.
Sulpicio Lines announced three days after the accident that the Doña Paz was insured for ?25 million (about US$1 million in 2011 dollars), and it was willing to indemnify the survivors the amount of 20 thousand (US$472 in 2011) for each victim . Days later, hundreds of family members of the victims staged a rally at theRizal Park demanding that the ship owners likewise indemnify the families of those who were not listed on the manifest, as well as to give a full accounting of the missing.
According to the initial investigation conducted by the Philippine Coast Guard, only one apprentice member of the crew of the Doña Paz was monitoring the bridge when the accident occurred.Other officers were either drinking beer or watching television, while the ship’s captain was watching a movie on his Betamax.Nonetheless, subsequent inquiries revealed that the Vector was operating without a license, lookout or properly qualified master.] The Board of Marine Inquiry eventually cleared Sulpicio Lines of fault in the accident.In 1999, the Philippine Supreme Court ruled that it was the owners of the Vector who were liable to indemnify the victims of the collision. Some of the claims pursued against either Sulpicio Lines or the owners of the Vector, such as those filed by the Cañezal family (who lost two members) and the Macasas family (who lost three members) were adjudicated by the Supreme Court, which found that even the families of victims who did not appear on the official manifest were entitled to indemnity.Caltex Philippines, which had chartered the Vector, was likewise cleared of financial liability.
What ever happens, someone has to take the rap.
All we can do is pray that we are never put into a position or situation such as the one that confronted Captain Schettino.
In a period of less than 15 minutes, his life and those of many thousand more have been indelibly changed. His life much of what is left could be in jail. His family will be in all probability will be harassed and victimised. They will in all probability be financially ruined.
For the family of the victims the heart ache will never go away….the same for the thousands affected by the Donna Paz.
And still we talk, and read and watch the Titanic sinking…the worlds most famous shipping disaster…….Maybe what comes out of the Costa Concordia enquiry will provide similar fascination
I will write again soon
Lindsay Walker
24th January 2012.