SharkTums Posted January 24, 2012 Share Posted January 24, 2012 I don't think the Muster Drill would have actually saved any lives. Especially when there's video of that bitchy woman telling everyone at the muster locations to go back to their cabins, it's just an electrical problem!!!!! I hope she can't sleep at night. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chroniq Posted January 24, 2012 Share Posted January 24, 2012 (edited) Regarding the muster drills- I read on cruise critic that this ship picks up people in nearly every port they visit (at least according to their official review and I'm not sure if that policy has changed). I read that this is the reason they don't have a muster drill at 5:00pm like on a typical cruise ship (which only picks up new pax at one port) .They try to combine 2 port pick ups with one drill. Again, this is what I read on one of the official cruisecritic.com reviews from 2006 and I'm not sure if it is still accurate. I wouldn't be surprised if it is though. Edited January 24, 2012 by Chroniq Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThrillTV Posted January 24, 2012 Share Posted January 24, 2012 I think something as important as a muster drill should be monitored. I mean the ship shouldn't be able to leave without confirming (like sending in a report in a sense) that it has been accomplished already. The situation is just a mess. I believe even on shorter (not like as soon as you leave you arrive) cruises should be mandatory. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OISU8P Posted January 24, 2012 Share Posted January 24, 2012 We did ours in port prior to leaving. I remember this because the people at the bar across from port where pointing and laughing at everyone on board. I always thought that it was required when we did it to leave, this way they could still boot anyone who refused. That is just cray that they have 24 hours though. Even though it may have not mentioned much of a difference as Sharktums pointed out in the instance. It just seems like a ship could get pretty far out in a 24 hour period. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robbalvey Posted January 24, 2012 Share Posted January 24, 2012 I don't think the Muster Drill would have actually saved any lives. Oh, I agree. It's just still crazy that it wasn't required. Especially when there's video of that bitchy woman telling everyone at the muster locations to go back to their cabins, it's just an electrical problem!!!!! I hope she can't sleep at night. You mean from the images of a five year old girl drowning in her stateroom with her life vest on haunting her in her sleep? Yeah... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BelizeIt Posted January 24, 2012 Share Posted January 24, 2012 Wait I thought Carnival offered a 30% discount on your next Carnival cruise, so isn't all forgiven? Anyhow, sadly it takes a tragic event like this to change procedures that should have already been in place. (Like the muster drill). Because ANY other ship out there that was doing anything similar to Carnival, has now changed its procedures. It just makes sense to do a muster drill before a ship 'leaves' port, rather than within 24 hours or whatever. Carnival with endure this event, though it will be a costly $$$ mistake for them and their shareholders. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kidcoaster 2 Posted January 24, 2012 Share Posted January 24, 2012 I really hope those still missing were not swept out to sea. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ginzo Posted January 24, 2012 Share Posted January 24, 2012 the blame ABSOLUTELY lies on the parent company of Carnival. Yeah, it's an interesting arrangement where the parent company just cashes checks from their subsidiaries without assuming any of the business risks. Where do I sign up for that deal? Do I send my payment to Bernie Madoff? Also, do I get a free unicorn with my investment? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kunpc1 Posted January 24, 2012 Share Posted January 24, 2012 I don't think the Muster Drill would have actually saved any lives. Especially when there's video of that bitchy woman telling everyone at the muster locations to go back to their cabins, it's just an electrical problem!!!!! I hope she can't sleep at night. My jaw dropped when I saw this video. The message across the P.A. system was saying one thing while this woman was yelling something completely different. I can definitely see how people would have listened to her, you like to think the staff know what they're talking about. If people had been properly evacuated right away, I wonder what the missing/death toll would be today. How did SO MANY things FAIL on this trip? No (late) Muster Drill, going off course (is no one notified when a half-billion dollar ship goes off course - especially more than once?), crazy captain abandons ship, staff obviously not trained properly... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tntornadox Posted January 24, 2012 Share Posted January 24, 2012 The refund and 30% off future cruises is for those who had Concordia booked, not those who were onboard the night of the accident as has been reported and ran with by the media (surprise, surprise), apparently it was never intended for survivors. Some journalists took the press release, read between the lines and ran with it. Costa is refunding the cruise, any out of pocket expenses for returning home for the survivors and further compensation will be forthcoming. EDIT: Great article on Cruise Critic outlining all compensation: www.cruisecritic.com/news/news.cfm?ID=4716 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RandallDuell Posted January 25, 2012 Share Posted January 25, 2012 Thanks for the update, that 30% thing made no sense...no surprise that it was misread, then spread like wildfire by the media and critics. It is truly agonizing to even think about having a loved one who died on that ship, in that manner. What a horrific thing to have happened, I hope that the Italian judicial system does all it says it's gonna do with the Captain. What an awful man. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stellaclose Posted January 25, 2012 Share Posted January 25, 2012 Does anyone think this could be the death of Carnival? I'll admit it's an awfully big company, but with the facts coming out the way they are, I know I would never consider taking a Carnival cruise, and I can't imagine I'm alone. I don't think Carnival will be going away anywhere. In fact I think Carnival will follow the same path that New Corp did with the whole News of the World debacle. They'll either shut the Costa line down or sell it off. After everything that has come to light and the continued bad publicity, I think they'll just want to wash their hands clean of Costa. The other option they may have is to rebrand Costa. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tntornadox Posted January 25, 2012 Share Posted January 25, 2012 There have been talks of that, but I don't see Costa going away or re-branding due to the fact it's a very proud name in Italy with a great heritage, it wasn't a name Carnival came up with, they bought Costa from the remnants of the founding family. The line was founded in 1854 to run olive oil, they began passenger service in the late 40s before being sold to Carnival Corporation in 2000. Costa has since grown to a fleet of 16 cruise ships, is Europe's largest and most popular cruise line and alone accounts for nearly 20% of Carnival Corporation's overall revenue, as well as being Carnival's pre-dominant international brand. Costa operates in more regions of the world than any other Carnival brand, even here in the U.S. (Canada & New England) as well as the Caribbean. I think what you will see happen is a cleaning of house at Costa... then a major PR campaign and slashed rates to lure passengers back. Indeed, Costa is still growing and will need to fill at least two new vessels- another Concordia class vessel enters the fleet this May and a Costa variant of the Carnival Dream-class enters service in 2014 and will have the honor of being their largest ship in history. (Random fact, Royal Caribbean was interested in Costa and even went as far as sending people to look over their books before withdrawing in the mid-90s due to their own debt troubles. After RCL left the picture, Carnival swooped in. Given their acquisition of a European brand, RCL felt compelled to make a European purchase of their own- they purchased Celebrity from Chandris the following year.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kidcoaster 2 Posted January 25, 2012 Share Posted January 25, 2012 Now the captain is saying he was under pressure by his bosses to steer so close to the island Costa Concordia captain Francesco Schettino 'under intense pressure to sail close to Giglio'Francesco Schettino, the captain of the Costa Concordia, was secretly recorded by police claiming that his bosses put him under intense pressure to sail the cruise ship close to Giglio island in order to present a spectacle to passengers. "Management was always saying 'pass by there, pass by there'. Someone else in my position might not have been so amenable to pass so close but they busted my balls, pass by there, pass by there, and now I'm paying for it," Capt Francesco Schettino, 52, told a friend during a telephone conversation in the hours after he was arrested. Genoa-based Costa Cruises insists that it never authorised him to steer so close to the island on the night of Jan 13, in a risky manoeuvre that resulted in the 1,000ft long liner ramming into rocks and capsizing. But the tape recordings appear to back up claims by the captain and his lawyers that the cruise company in fact encouraged the practise, because it was good "publicity" and went down well with passengers in the increasingly competitive cruise ship business. The captain's conversation was covertly taped when he was held in a police station in Orbetello on the Italian mainland, after being arrested on Giglio in the hours after the chaotic evacuation of the giant ship. He called a friend on his mobile phone and told him: "When I realised that the ship was listing, I left and got off it." He also repeated claims that the rocky islet that the ship smashed into was not marked by his electronic navigation systems. "The shoal was there, but it was not indicated by my instruments and we hit it." He had been relying instead on a paper chart and on the advice of Mario Palombo, a former colleague and veteran Costa captain to whom the 'salute' to Giglio was intended. Capt Palombo has a house on the tiny Tuscan holiday resort, although ironically he was not there on the night of the sail-past. The rocky islet that the giant liner collided with rises several feet out of the water and is clearly marked even on tourist maps of the island. Capt Schettino, who has been dubbed 'Captain Coward' by the Italian media, insisted to his friend that once a huge rip had been torn in the 450 million euro ship and water began flooding into its engine rooms, he did his utmost to ground it on the shore and save lives. "The hole was immense. There was a spike of rock. But everything that happened from that moment on, I performed to the utmost extent of my professionalism." He said he did his best to "alleviate" a desperate situation, as 4,200 terrified passengers and crew donned life jackets and prepared to abandon ship in the darkness. "I'm proud that we saved so many people, including some who would not have managed," he said during the intercepted call. His efforts that night might at least gave him "the illusion of being at peace with my conscience," he said. Capt Schettino is being held under house arrest at his home in Meta di Sorrento, near Naples. He faces charges of causing a shipwreck, abandoning ship and multiple counts of manslaughter. The death toll is 16, with about 20 people of half a dozen nationalities still missing. Prosecutors objected to a judge's decision to release him from custody and will appeal against the ruling on Feb 10, asking that he be returned to jail. Domnica Cemortan, 25, a Moldovan cruise ship dancer who reportedly had dinner with the captain in the hour before the collision, is to be interviewed by Italian prosecutors by telephone on Friday. During the call made from the police station, a clearly shaken Capt Schettino said his sailing days were over. "I don't ever want to go back on a boat. I'm going to change my life." Lawyers for a group of Italian survivors said that responsibility for the accident extended beyond Capt Schettino to his superiors. "We don't believe that everything can be blamed on a moment of madness by the captain," said Francesco Compagna and Pietro Ilardi in a statement. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/italy/9037602/Costa-Concordia-captain-Francesco-Schettino-under-intense-pressure-to-sail-close-to-Giglio.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tntornadox Posted January 25, 2012 Share Posted January 25, 2012 He has a new excuse near daily, I don't believe anything he says after he said he accidentally tripped and fell into a lifeboat along with several other senior officers... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Swiminn6 Posted January 26, 2012 Share Posted January 26, 2012 Salvage operations are starting to begin. ROME (AP) – A barge carrying a crane and other equipment hitched itself to the toppled Costa Concordia on Tuesday, signaling the start of preliminary operations to remove a half-million gallons of fuel from the grounded cruise ship before it leaks into the pristine Tuscan sea. Actual pumping of the oil isn't expected to begin until Saturday, but teams from the Dutch shipwreck salvage firm Smit were working on the bow of the Concordia on Tuesday and divers were to make underwater inspections to identify the precise locations of the fuel tanks. They were at work on the now-hitched Meloria barge as divers who blasted through a submerged section of the third-floor deck located another body from the wreckage, bringing the death toll to 16. It sounds like extracting the fuel is going to be hard! Well at least in my opinion, what do you think? Officials have identified an initial six fuel tanks that will be drilled into, tapped and outfitted with hoses to vacuum out the oil from the Costa Concordia. Franco Gabrielli, head of the national civil protection agency, told reporters Tuesday that once those initial six tanks are emptied, 50% of the fuel aboard the ship will have been extracted. The pumping will continue 24 hours a day barring rough seas or technical glitches, he said, noting that these six tanks are relatively easy to access. "At this stage, we don't see a big risk in an oil spill, but if weather deteriorates nobody can tell what the vessel will do," Bart Huizing, head of operations at Smit, told the Associated Press. ..."It's never a routine, there is always a risk, but we've done this before, so at this moment we don't see any problems," Huizing told AP. "But still it is difficult because it's really heavy fuel oil which we most probably need to heat before we can pump." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrMorgan Posted January 27, 2012 Share Posted January 27, 2012 (edited) I have a (non Concordia related) question: Has anyone ever been on a cruise where someone got left behind??? I recorded this video of 2 people returning late to the Mariner of the Seas while the whole ship watched and booed them, but we waited almost a half an hour. Now that I've been looking around, I realize that people get left behind quite often! What happens then? How do they get their stuff? (edited to fix video link) Edited January 27, 2012 by MrMorgan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
B&MIntaminGCI Posted January 27, 2012 Share Posted January 27, 2012 ^According to my aunts who've been on cruises where that's happened, and that have friends that showed up late, you basically have to get to the next port where the ship is on your own and meet it there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kidcoaster 2 Posted January 27, 2012 Share Posted January 27, 2012 I have a (non Concordia related) question: Has anyone ever been on a cruise where someone got left behind??? I recorded this video of 2 people returning late to the Mariner of the Seas while the whole ship watched and booed them, but we waited almost a half an hour. Now that I've been looking around, I realize that people get left behind quite often! What happens then? How do they get their stuff? This is the best answer I have found. There's always alot of talk about people not wanting to do independent excursions for fear of missing the ship. This just goes to show that you don't have to be on an excursion to miss the ship. I've had long conversations with a couple of captains about this very issue and the bottom line is communication. If you are going to be late for whatever reason, you need to communicate with the ship. In your daily newsletter, the contact information for the local port authority is always shown. Take this with you whenever you go into port - it can be invaluable. The captains have told me they do not ever want to leave anyone in port and they will try their best to insure it doesn't, but they need to know what's going on. If the passengers contact the ship and let them know they'll be late, the captain will try to delay departure, within reason and accounting for all factors involved (time to next port, how long of a delay, etc). In the case of this couple, they simply got to the pier too late and there's not much they can do. As was stated on the video, sometimes they can get a boat and catch up to the ship. But most of the time, they're going to be stuck getting their own transportation to the next port, which ain't cheap. Believe it or not, this happens in Cozumel on a regular basis and the number one reason is the time difference. That's why is so vitally important to have your watch set to ship time and do not use any other clock/watch for your time checks. You also have to double check the time you have to be back on the ship - this is always posted as you leave the ship. So, will the ship leave you? In the absence of communication with the ship, absolutely! Not sure who of these two were at fault, but as was stated on the video, one of them will never hear the end of this little episode. Pete http://www.cruiselinefans.com/cruise-questions-advice/53843-does-cruise-ship-wait-you.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SharkTums Posted January 27, 2012 Share Posted January 27, 2012 Morgan, you don't normally watch the 'Running of the Drunks'?!!? That's the best part of every port day! Every cruise you'll see someone left behind, usually drunk people or people that forgot to adjust their watches for a time change and very rarely people that had independent tours or a problem of some sort. Trust me, 95% of the time it's drunk people! Depending on the port different things happen. On ports where a harbor pilot takes the ship out, you can actually pay off some locals to bring you to the ship on a smaller boat once it's away from the dock for when a boat picks up the local pilot once the big ship is out of the harbor. Even if you call the ship and tell them you're going to be late, they don't wait most of the time. They are on very strict schedules as well as tidal issues, etc. There's a great story from a Mediterranean cruise where a ship-sponsored shore excursion was running so behind that the ship couldn't even wait for them (the ship would have gotten stuck in low tide), so they had to get all of the shore excursion guests to the next port. Trouble was, some of them had left their children on the ship in the kids club! It was a very nice story with a good ending, but still freaks some parents out. We run our TPR Trips the same way as the cruise lines. Super strict on time departures. They are important for more reasons than you can even think of. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thrillrider Posted January 27, 2012 Share Posted January 27, 2012 Once they pump the fuel out of the ship, then what? Are they towing it out to sea, or are they going to try and save the ship and repair it somehow? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SharkTums Posted January 27, 2012 Share Posted January 27, 2012 ^They haven't decided yet. The insurance and salvage companies plan to do full inspections to decide what to do next. Pumping the fuel/oil out was a bigger concern as that could impact the environment. Oh, and Costa released compensation. $14,500 per person who was on the ship. Thoughts? Too little? Too much? Note, those who were injured or missing/dead will have different payouts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OCJ48 Posted January 27, 2012 Share Posted January 27, 2012 Is it $14,500 and a refund, or just $14,500? If it's a refund as well, that's pretty reasonable in my eyes. If not, it may be a bit low, but either way, it's not an insult like the claimed 1/3 off next cruise thing was. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SharkTums Posted January 27, 2012 Share Posted January 27, 2012 From Cruise Critic: Passengers who were onboard Costa Concordia when it struck a rock and capsized will each be compensated 11,000 euros (about $14,500), according to a statement from Costa Crociere, which owns and operates the ship. The amount will cover "all patrimonial and non-patrimonial damages, including loss of baggage and personal effects, psychological distress and loss of enjoyment of the cruise vacation," said the statement. The lump sum extends to non-paying children as well, regardless of age. To me that reads as $14k total. I'm really not sure how I feel, I can't decide if that's a good deal or bad deal. I don't think any of us can judge since we weren't on board. I think it seems reasonable, but if someone claims they had expensive jewelry in their cabin safe or something then maybe not? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BeemerBoy Posted January 27, 2012 Share Posted January 27, 2012 Oh, and Costa released compensation. $14,500 per person who was on the ship. Thoughts? Too little? Too much? Nothing less than $50,000, and a chance to kick Micky Arison in the nuts. Note, those who were injured or missing/dead will have different payouts. They're gonna pay the dead people? Interesting strategy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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