Costa Concordia disaster: Crew urged 'return to cabins'?

[Atheist-Lite]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-16641592

Costa Concordia disaster: Crew urged 'return to cabins'

A video has emerged showing the crew of the Costa Concordia reassuring passengers nothing was wrong, after the cruise ship had begun taking in water.

In the amateur footage, a crew member says "everything is under control" and asks passengers to go to their cabins.

It is thought the delay in deciding to abandon the ship may have cost lives. At least 11 people died.

(continued)

Can someone please post my poll on RatSkep for comparison? See how many ask about the precise angle?

[Warren Dew]

So what was the precise angle, anyway?

[Atheist-Lite]

So what was the precise angle, anyway?

I'm not waiting to find out, seen the movie, scoots pas't crew onto deck.

What's the worst that can happ....

[Atheist-Lite]

Anything causing a ship with tonnage of 114,500 to jolt must be significant?

[Jesus_of_Nazareth]

The most important thing that is missing from the story so far is an accurate timeline.

If the ship was still steaming towards a port (or at least an easier place to effect a rescue) - then IMO telling folks to return to cabins was a good idea. It's where their lifejackets are and the last thing that is needed at that point is 4,000 panicking passengers, or even 4,000 trying to get on deck at the same time. Some Numpties would jump overboard and either be injured. or die.

At that point the ship was not listing (as can be seen in the Video)......and even within an hour the Captain / Crew would not have known how badly damaged the ship was - remember that the damaged parts of the hull would be underwater, and even seeing the damage would have been difficult, let alone assessing it.

An evacuation at sea is no easy thing to acheive, with 10, let alone 4,000 and will have casualties (it's not a "Just in case" thing to do)......and of course there were no outside resources on hand (of the scale needed) to effect such a rescue.

The Capt has already put his hands up to the Navigational error (to the Judge, not to the Media) - and will rightly be nailed to a cross for that, what his decisions / actions were afterwards will take time to untangle. For a Disneyland experiance stay onshore - at sea their are always risks.

My bet is that the company / owners will also be at fault, as well as the ship design (it's basically a floating skyscraper - no way to cope with a major failure, nor evac folks quickly / with 100% safety).

[Atheist-Lite]

The crew would be unlikely to be senior crew and would not know the precise location of the ship. They may have been in deep water for all the crew in question knew. If everyone had remained in their cabins rather than making a panic rush for the deck hundreds may have drowned in their life jackets in their cabins. On some occasions instinct and anarchy which comes with it is for the best. It is a survival instinct to panic and rush around when things look suddenly pretty grim.

[Tero]

What exactly is the business advantage of one big ship over two little ones? They keep ordering bigger and bigger and Finns build them, barely clearing Sweden Denmark bridge.

[Svartalf]

Economies of scale. the fuel, mmaintenance and crewing of two ships would be more expensive than one ship of double capacity.

[Tero]

But you would have two captains! Not both drunk at any one time.