GIGLIO, Italy—Salvage
crews are working against time to remove the shipwrecked Costa Concordia cruise
ship, which is slowly being crushed under its own weight on its perch of
granite seabed off the Tuscan island of Giglio. Officials said Monday that if
this attempt fails, there won't be a second chance.
Nick Sloane, the leader
of the salvage operation, said the Concordia has compressed some 3 meters (10
feet) since it came to rest on its side on the rocky perch Jan. 13, 2012, after
ramming a jagged reef when it skirted too close to the island during a
publicity stunt allegedly ordered by the captain; 32 people were killed.
Sloane, an engineer for
U.S.-owned company Titan Salvage, said experts would have one chance to pull
the ship upright and float it away to the mainland for demolition. The attempt
will probably take place in mid-September. "We cannot put it back"
down and start over, said Sloane.
Sloane spoke aboard a
work boat as he accompanied journalists for a close-hand look of the wreckage
on the eve of the trial of Capt. Francesco Schettino, who is charged with
manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning the ship before all passengers
had been evacuated.
The trial, which was
supposed to get under way July 9, was postponed until Wednesday due to a
lawyers' strike. The Italian captain denies wrongdoing, and claims his skillful
guiding of the ship after the collision helped save countless lives.
The timetable to remove
the Concordia has also been back. The original plan envisioned removal before
start of this summer, but bad weather undermined those plans.
"We lost two months
to weather," said salvage master Sloane, explaining that the season's
harsh sea conditions made it risky for diving teams to work, including
installing bags that are filled with cement to provide a more stable base when
the flat-keeled ship is pulled upright.
Sloane said the granite
seabed also proved more resistant to drilling than imagined. It was "like
trying to drill through glass at a 45-degree angle."
Pressure to make the
unprecedented operation succeed is mounting as experts worry that a small
window of opportunity to pull off the ambitious feat could shut in a few
months.
"Another winter and
we might not be able to parbuckle," Sloane said, using the nautical term
for righting a ship. He expressed concern that the ship might compress even
further, making it impossible to pull it up upright and into a position so it
can be floated away.
The project calls for
dozens of crane-like pulleys flanking the ship to slowly start tilting the
vessel upright at a rate of 3 meters (yards) per hour. In all, the parbuckling
should take about 12 hours.
On Monday several
welders moved like Spiderman on the now horizontal hull, securing steel pieces
which will function like hooks. Steel chains weighing 17,000 tons are being
looped under the wreck to help pull it upright. So far 18 chains have been
laid, with the remaining four to be put in place over the next few days.
To work on the tilted
wreck, the welders were given five days of climbing training on nearly sheer
granite rocks on the island by instructors from Italy's Dolomite mountains.
Crews are also attaching
caissons, or tanks, to the exposed flank of the Concordia. The caissons will be
filled with water to add weight and help pull the ship upright. Identical
caissons will be attached to the submerged side of the ship once it's righted.
The caissons on both sides will then be filled with air to float the ship up
off the rocks so it can be towed away.
The 70-meter-long gash
on the Concordia's hull has been largely covered with metal plates, though an
exposed 3-meter (10 foot) wide hole remains, resembling a truck garage
entrance. Crews said there was no need to cover that remaining hole. The gash
itself wasn't repaired, since engineers said it wasn't necessary. The salvage
operation extracted 96 tons of granite reef from the hole, Sloane said.
Just inside the gashed
area were four compartments designed to be water-tight, including engine rooms,
Sloane noted.
At the very top level of
the luxury liner, just over the area where the reef speared the ship like a
jagged knife, was the passenger dining room. Its big picture windows gave
diners a view of the lights of Giglio as the Concordia tried to glide close to
the coast, the inky blackness of a winter's night view broken only by the
lights in islanders' houses.
Survivors have recounted
how, many of them dressed in cocktail dresses and suits, were just sitting down
for a gala first-night meal when the collision occurred, setting off panic and
confusion with no quick word from the crew about what exactly had happened.
After slamming into the
reef off Giglio, the ship drifted toward port, where, badly listing as it
rapidly took on seawater, it capsized. Passengers described a frantic and
delayed evacuation, with the bridge initially insisting to inquiring coast
guardsmen that the ship had merely suffered a blackout.
Bodies of two of the
victims—an Italian passenger and of a Filipino waiter—were never found.
Every day, divers
"see mattresses and towels hanging from balconies. Every time they see it,
they are very aware ... there are still bodies" possibly under the wreck,
Sloane said. The removal projects' divers haven't gone into the wreckage; the
futile search for the last two victims' bodies was conducted earlier by fire
department and coast guard divers.
Franco Porcellacchia,
coordinator of removal plans for Costa, which is owned by Miami-based Carnival
Corp., estimated that the removal would cost about 500 million euros, paid for
by insurers.
Where the wreck will be
towed for demolition—assuming it can be floated away—has yet to be decided,
although Italian media have mentioned the Tuscan port of Piombino as a
possibility. Porcellacchia said one difficulty is finding a port that can handle
the cruise ship's dimensions, which will be made even wider by the caissons
that will be attached to each side.
While Giglio has fretted
about losing tourists because of the wreck, the island's port bustled with
vacationers Monday. And the removal has brought new business: Two hotels
overlooking the wreck are booked year-round by crews.
At cafes near the port
on Monday, welders in work jumpsuits and rubber boots rubbed elbows with
sunbathers in shorts and flip-flops.
A bronze plaque along a
harbor wall lists the name of the 32 people who perished on what was supposed
to be a pleasure cruise.
Source:
mercury news. 15 July 2013
http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_23662194/salvage-crews-rush-1-chance-move-concordia
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