Hoping All Our Members are Safe

[cessna152towser]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/0...n_1205951.html
The big news story here in Europe today is the sinking of the cruise ship Costa Concordia off the Italian coast. It is almost like the Titanic disaster repeating itself a hundred years on, though fortunately much closer to shore so many more survivors. Three confirmed dead and at the time of typing this there are still more than fifty people unaccounted for.
Mainly Europeans on board, Italian, French, German and Brits.
Up until Christmas my girlfriend Gabrielle was driving feeder buses for passengers to and from Costa's Mediterranean cruises.
There have been a few threads about cruise ships on Xmarksthescot as we appear to have quite a few of our members who participate in cruise ship holidays (vacations). I hope all our members are safe. Prayers for the survivors and for the relatives of those who are missing or confirmed dead.

[Father Bill]

Prayers indeed for all involved! Thanks for drawing this to our attention.

[Peter Crowe]

Prayers indeed for all involved! Thanks for drawing this to our attention.

***

[McClef]

+ 2 thanks Alex.

[Nighthawk]

Oh damn... That terrible. Prayers for all involved!

[ohiopiper]

Last I heard, the captain was being detained for jumping ship and leaving, deserting his post and failing to ensure orderly abandoning of ship.

The cap'n doesn't have to go down with the ship, but he'd better be on board until the last passenger and crew are off.

[BCAC]

Apparently the problem (they hit a rocky "sandbank") was announced 1 hour after it happened. The captain was dining. There were scenes of panic, people climbing over each other and such like. There were not enough lifejackets for everyone. The three fatal casualities died because they paniced, jumped overboard and drowned (only hundreds of yards from the shore).

It makes you wonder about those "floating hotels".

[cessna152towser]

Latest news is now five dead, but now only seventeen said to be still unaccounted for.