GIGLIO ISLAND (Italy): Shaken survivors and grieving relatives of the 32 victims of the Costa Concordia cruise ship disaster began arriving on the island of Giglio for a first anniversary commemoration of the tragedy on Sunday.
“It’s terrible coming back here,” one survivor, Clara Stara, said in the tiny Italian port where the giant hulk of a ship twice as big as the Titanic still lies keeled over on its side. “I’ve been anxious since yesterday and I hadn’t felt any fear for a whole year,” she said.
Among the arrivals was the family of Erika Fani Soria Molina, a Peruvian waitress who died. “This is very difficult for us,” said her sister Maddelein Soria, 35, as her father held back tears.
The 290-metre liner crashed into a group of rocks just off Giglio, veered sharply and keeled over just as many passengers were sitting down for supper on the first night of a Mediterranean cruise.
There were 4,229 people from 70 countries on board. Hundreds were forced to jump into the freezing waters after some of the lifeboats failed to deploy, while others climbed down a rope ladder across the hull in the dark to waiting boats.
Salvage workers have been labouring around the clock for months to stabilise the wreck and eventually refloat it and tow it away in an operation that has never been attempted before.
The removal has been hit by delays but the head of Italy’s civil protection agency, Franco Gabrielli, said it would happen by September at the latest.
Franco Porcellacchia, an executive from ship owner Costa Crociere who is overseeing the project, said the budget had increased from $300 million to $400 million (300 million euros) and could rise further.
Many survivors sought shelter in local homes and a church in the port after being pulled shivering from the sea following a panicky evacuation.
The Concordia’s infamous captain Francesco Schettino is accused of causing the crash through reckless seamanship and then abandoning ship before all the passengers had been rescued.
He is one of 10 people under investigation, including other crew members and three executives from Costa Crociere.—AFP