The most expensive operation in history: Lifting the Costa Concordia liner. Why did the Costa Concordia sink?

Not long ago, one of the most expensive and unprecedented projects in history was completed, which cost 600 million euros and involved more than 500 people from 24 countries around the world - the recovery of the cruise ship Costa Concordia, which partially sank off the coast of Tuscany (the island of Giglio).

Such an operation is almost unprecedented. The cases where such an amount of force was used can be counted on one hand. However, neither the risks associated with lifting the liner nor its high cost shook the engineers’ confidence that the lift was necessary.

History of the Costa Concordia wreck

On January 13, 2012, the liner was on the route 7 Night Winter Mediterranean, which involves leaving the port of Civitavecchia to Savona, the last cruise involved the liner calling at the ports of Barcelona, ​​Marseille and several other Italian ports.

January 13, 2012, 22:00 CET the ship was near the island of Giglio (Tuscany, Italy), most of the passengers were having dinner at the restaurant at that time. It was then that the Costa Concordia hit a reef, resulting in a hole of about 30 meters. The rescue operation began.

From this moment, disagreements begin between the participants in the events - passengers and personnel of the liner. It is worth noting that all data can be interpreted from the position of individual people, and there are many of these positions (if not to say that almost everyone has their own), but the essence is still the same. As the victims of the crash say, after the collision, the ship tilted, causing panic among most of the passengers; the reaction of the ship’s captain was not long in coming and the loudspeaker announced problems with the liner’s generator.

Despite the fact that further events will not develop for the better, the captain of the ship continues to adhere to this point of view. Despite this, the evacuation continues and passengers gather en masse near the boats. As many passengers note, the liner staff failed to organize a smooth loading onto the boats. According to the investigation, which was carried out later, it turned out that the captain of the ship, Schettino, was among the first to leave the ship.

After loading onto the boats and launching, the personnel and passengers were transported to the shore, where the victims were provided with first aid. It is worth noting the help of local residents, who provided the passengers with warm clothes, food and allocated places to stay for the night. Passengers occupied schools, churches and hotels.

Victims of the Costa Concordia cruise ship sinking

On the morning of January 14, 2012, Costa Concordia lay on its starboard side, touching the bottom. Search operations for missing persons are being organized.

As of January 17, the number of victims was 11 people, and 25 people were listed as missing. By early February, search operations in the submerged part of the ship were stopped due to the risk to scuba divers conducting search and rescue operations. And by the end of March, information was received about 30 dead and two missing.

Causes of the passenger airliner accident and punishment for those responsible

As the investigation found, the cause of the accident was a collision of the liner with a reef; among other things, a technical failure of the liner’s equipment cannot be ruled out. Experts were outraged by the fact that despite the fact that the liner passes this route 52 times a year, there was a deviation from the course by 3-4 miles. This can be explained by the initial statements of the captain of the liner, Francesco Schettino, who said that by moving towards the coastline he wanted to greet his friend (the former captain of the Costa Concordia), who lives on the island. However, later, Schettino retracted his testimony and shifted the blame to the company manager, who, according to him, insisted that the ship come closer to the shore.

Decoding the black box showed that the ship was too close to the shore, the start of the evacuation occurred too late, in addition, the captain never sent a distress signal, which delayed the start of the rescue operation. Until July 17, 2013, Schettino was under house arrest by court order. The trial is currently underway, and the prosecutor's proposed sentence is 2,697 years in prison.

Liquidation of consequences and rise of Costa Concordia

Just three days after the ship sank, an oily liquid began to leak from the vessel; experts reassured the public with assurances that it was not fuel. Fuel pumping began as there was a possibility that the ship would slide off the cliff. If this happened, more than 2,000 tons could end up at sea. Naturally, such a prospect did not make anyone smile. However, already on March 24 it was announced that the fuel had been pumped out, and literally a month later a tender was held to lift and evacuate the vessel, which was won by Titan Salvage.

The plan for raising the vessel is quite simple, but it required significant investments, and the operation itself was associated with a high risk of failure, as both company engineers and leading experts have said more than once. In mid-2013, work continues to prepare for the lifting of the vessel.

On September 16 at 9 am, the operation to raise the Costa Concordia began. The length of the liner is 290 meters, the angle of roll was 70 degrees, and the water level was 20 meters. The planned operation time is ideally 12 hours. Below is a graphic plan for lifting the liner.

On September 17, after 19 hours, the operation was finally completed successfully; it was possible to bring the ship into a horizontal position. Following the results of the operation, Franco Porselaki, vice president of ARNIVAL CORPORATION, reported that everything went perfectly, and most importantly, no harm to the environment was noticed. However, despite the fact that the ascent was completed successfully, experts do not consider it necessary to relax and remind that this is not the end. In the spring, the liner will have to be transported to the shipyard, where the Costa Concordia will be dismantled.

On the night of Friday the 13th, the luxury cruise ship Costa Concordia with more than 3,200 passengers and 1,000 crew on board hit a reef, listed and partially sank off the coast of the island of Giglio, Italy. Six people have already been confirmed dead, including two French passengers and one crew member from Peru. They all drowned in the waters of the Mediterranean Sea after the crash. 14 people are still missing and rescuers continue to search for survivors. The accident occurred just a few hours after departure, and passengers had not yet been given a safety briefing, so the ship was in chaos during the evacuation. Captain Francesco Schettino was arrested. Among other charges, he is also accused of being one of the first to abandon ship. This issue contains photographs of the sunken Costa Concordia and attempts to find 14 passengers.

(Total 22 photos)

1. "Costa Concordia" after the crash off the coast of the island of Giglio. Six passengers drowned and 14 are still missing after an Italian liner ran aground with 4,200 people on board. The Costa Concordia set sail in the Mediterranean when it struck a reef on Friday 13 January. (Filippo Monteforte/AFP/Getty Images)

2. Passengers with life jackets on board the Costa Concordia wait for the operation to begin. (AP Photo/Courtesy from tourist aboard the ship)

3. The cruise ship Costa Concordia tilted and ran aground off the coast of the island of Giglio. (AP Photo/Giglionews.it, Giorgio Fanciulli)

4. A Costa Concordia passenger arrived with others at the port of Santo Stefano after the ship sank. One of the passengers jumped into the icy waters when panic began. The ship sailed through the Mediterranean to Savona with planned stops in Civitavecchia, Palermo, Cagliari, Palma, Barcelona and Marseille. (Filippo Monteforte/AFP/Getty Images)

5. A family from the Costa Concordia arrived at the bay in Marseille. (AP Photo/Claude Paris)

6. "Costa Concordia" off the west coast of the island of Giglio in Italy. (Reuters/Italian Guardia di Finanza)

7. Costa Concordia lies on its side after the crash. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

8. Holes in the ship's hull. (Reuters/Stringer)

9. Firefighters inspect huge rocks protruding from the hull of the Costa Concordia cruise ship the day after the crash. (AP Photo/Andrea Sinibaldi, Lapresse)

10. "Costa Concordia" surrounded by small ships. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

11. “Costa Concordia” at night in the bay of the Tuscan island of Giglio. (Filippo Monteforte/AFP/Getty Images)

12. A rescue ship illuminates a sunken liner. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

13. Italian firefighters climb the Costa Concordia. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

14. Firefighters inspect a half-sunken ship. (Filippo Monteforte/AFP/Getty Images)

15. Rescuers check the waters around the Costa Concordia after the shipwreck. (Filippo Monteforte/AFP/Getty Images)

16. People look at a pile of sun loungers on the tilting deck of the Costa Concordia. (Filippo Monteforte/AFP/Getty Images)

17. Partially submerged cabins of the Costa Concordia liner. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

18. An Italian firefighting helicopter picks up passengers from the Costa Concordia liner. Firefighters worked throughout Sunday to rescue a crew member with a broken leg 36 hours after the tragedy. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

19. Divers inspect the half-submerged Costa Concordia. (Filippo Monteforte/AFP/Getty Images)

20. Italian coast guard with a black box from the Costa Concordia liner. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

21. Costa Concordia cruise ship captain Francesco Schettino (right) is put into a police car in Grosseto, Italy. Schettino was arrested on charges of first-degree murder and being one of the first to abandon ship. (Reuters/Enzo Russo/ANSA)

22. "Costa Concordia" off the west coast of the island of Giglio, Italy. (Reuters/Stringer)

At least 6 people died as a result of the disaster of the cruise ship Costa Concordia, which ran aground and then sank in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Italy.
It is noted that the number of victims may increase, since after the disaster some passengers jumped overboard into cold water, and their fate still remains unknown.
Two hours before the disaster, a malfunction of the power system was detected on the cruise ship, but the ship still went to sea.
The cruise of the passenger liner Costa Concordia, which sank off the coast of Tuscany on Saturday night, almost caused the death of several thousand tourists from all over the world due to technical problems on the ship, as well as uncoordinated actions of the crew.

A few hours before leaving the port, a malfunction in the electrical system was detected on the liner, but the captain of the ship decided not to delay the departure of the Costa Concordia and not to carry out additional checks.
The ship came too close to the shore; the underwater terrain of this area is a rocky ridge of reefs.
One of the main reasons for the disaster is said to be the inattention of the command or an error in navigation instruments, which is why the giant liner hit a reef and received a hole - as a result, the board immediately began to take on water and tilt.


The ship's crew was also unable to organize an urgent evacuation. According to eyewitnesses, Costa Concordia workers delayed the launching of lifeboats. Later, due to the strong list, it was no longer possible to place people in the boat.
Panic began among the passengers: seeing that it was almost impossible to get into the boats, many began to jump into the icy water in fear, because they were afraid to go to the bottom with the ship.
At the moment when the ship was holed, the passengers had just begun their dinner.
“Suddenly we heard a noise, and the ship seemed to be dragged somewhere. The lights went out, dishes and tables began to fall. A terrible panic arose, says Italian Luciano Castro.


People, in horror, got out of the sinking ship themselves; there were no signals to action from the ship’s crew. People scattered.


-Have you watched Titanic? This is exactly what happened to us,” says Valerie Anagnas, 31, from Los Angeles. When the ship tilted, she, along with her parents and sister, had to crawl up the corridors between the cabins.
“We crawled in the dark, only the strobe on the life jacket was blinking,” recalls Valerie’s mother. “We heard dishes breaking and people being thrown against the walls.
Mara Parmigiani, a surviving church worker from Germany, was given a cruise ticket by her husband. The woman set sail for the first time in her life and almost died on the very first night on the ship. We managed to escape miraculously. Documents, personal belongings and money were flooded under water.
- The crew only told us to remain in our places and not do anything. We were told that our lives were not in danger,” says the victim.


After some time, people were instructed to put on life jackets and move towards the rafts. However, the passengers were blocked on the liner; it turned over on its side, depriving people of the opportunity to get closer to the boats.
“If it weren’t for the boat passing by that came to help, I think we most likely would have died,” says Mara Parmigiani.


Those passengers who did not have enough life jackets and seats in the boats jumped overboard into the icy water out of despair.
One of the dead was a 65-year-old man. He suffered a heart attack.


Local barges that received a rescue signal, as well as search helicopters, came to the aid of the victims. Many were picked up directly from the open sea.
At the same time, no one counted those rescued ashore. All figures provided to the authorities were approximate.


At the time of the disaster, there were 4,240 people on board, of which 1,032 were crew members. Tourists cruising the Mediterranean were from Italy, Germany, France, Great Britain and Russia. Total - 3208 people.
Eight people are listed as dead, about 67 were injured, and the search for the victims continues. Rescuers are searching for at least 70 more people.
108 Russian citizens on board were rescued. According to information from the Russian embassy in Rome, their lives are not in danger.
The names of 102 Russians have been identified, said press secretary of the Russian Union of Tourism Industry Irina Tyurina. Most of them are already accommodated at the Hilton Hotel in Rome, the rest are being taken there. Tourists are left without money, passports, luggage and will soon be without communication: mobile phones are gradually running out of charge.
Operators send copies of vacationers’ documents to the Russian consulate, according to which Russians will be returned home. Among the personnel of the liner there were Russian speakers. It is being clarified whether they were Russian citizens.

Information about the liner:


Costa Concordia - a Concordia class cruise ship was built in 2005 at the Fincantieri Sestri Ponente shipyard in Italy and since 2006 has sailed under the Italian flag between ports of the Mediterranean Sea. The sister ships are the Carnival Splendour, Costa Pacifica, Costa Favolosa, Costa Fascinosa and Costa Serena.


The length of the vessel is 290 meters, number of passengers: 3,700, crew: 1,100 people.
The ship has 14 passenger decks, 1,500 cabins, a three-level theater, a shopping gallery, 13 bars, cafes, 5 restaurants, 4 swimming pools, a beauty salon, a fitness center, Turkish baths and a sauna.

The liner Costa Concordia holds a sad record: it is the largest passenger ship ever lost in a shipwreck. We have already talked about the largest seven-masted schooner in history, the Thomas Lawson () and about the mystical prediction of its fate.

The schooner sank on Friday the 13th, and one of the novels written by the millionaire Thomas Lawson, whose name she bore, was called Friday the Thirteenth. So, the Costa Concordia also sank on Friday and also on the 13th!

The cruise liner Costa Concordia was built at the Italian shipyard Fincantieri in Sestri Ponente (a suburb of Geno) in 2006 by order of the company Costa Crociere. At that time, in the world ranking it was the 10th largest passenger ship and Costa's largest. Costa Concordia became the lead ship in a series of six units.

Costa Concordia had 13 decks; the maximum length of the vessel was 290.2 m, width - 35.5 m, draft - 8.2 m, gross tonnage - 114,147 brt. The combined diesel-electric power plant included 6 diesel generators with a total power of 102,780 hp. and two electric motors with a capacity of 21 MW. The maximum speed was 23 knots, operational speed was 19.6 knots.

One and a half thousand comfortable cabins of different classes (with an area from 16.7 to 44.8 sq.m.) could accommodate 3,780 passengers. All cabins were equipped with TV, telephone, air conditioning, bathroom and toilet. In addition, there were 14 elevators, 4 swimming pools, 5 restaurants, 13 bars, a theater, a two-level fitness center, a casino, and a Formula 1 simulator. The ship's own crew numbered 1,100 people.

The Costa Concordia set off on its maiden voyage on July 14, 2006 and was operated on cruise lines in the Western Mediterranean for several years. On the evening of January 13, 2012, the ship left the port of Civittavecchia heading to Savona. It was a regular 7 nights winter Mediterranean cruise. At approximately 21:30, near the island of Giglio, when most of the passengers were having dinner at a restaurant, the liner hits a stone reef on its left side and receives an underwater hole 53 m long (from the 52nd frame to the 125th). Five compartments, from the third to the eighth, quickly fill with water, the main engines stop. The Costa Concordia manages to coast a little more than a kilometer and turns its nose towards the harbor of Giglio. Then, under the influence of the wind, she drifts and at about 10 o'clock in the evening runs aground in the immediate vicinity of the coast. The ship, designed to maintain buoyancy only when two compartments are flooded, begins to sink with a list to starboard.

The plane crash seemed inexplicable. Everyone's bewilderment can be understood: the Costa Concordia sailed past the island of Giglio once a week, that is, 52 times a year, and how did it manage to hit a stone reef? Why did the liner deviate from its course by 3-4 miles?

Subsequently, the captain of the cruise ship, Francesco Schettino, admitted that he decided to bring the ship closer to the island of Giglio and greet the former captain of the Costa Concordia, his good friend, who lived there. He had done this several times on previous voyages, but on that ill-fated Friday he hesitated with the turn, and the liner crashed into the side of the rocks. The court found this version to be the most likely, although Schettino later changed his testimony. In particular, he claimed that he was forced to change course by a Carnival manager, but this claim was not supported by the facts.

At the time of the disaster, there were 3,216 passengers from 62 countries and 1,023 crew members on board. The passengers included 108 Russians, 45 citizens of Ukraine, 7 citizens of Moldova, 3 of Kazakhstan and 3 of Belarus. In addition, three of our compatriots were members of the airliner’s crew.

The rescue operation was organized extremely poorly. Instead of immediately beginning the evacuation of passengers, the captain of the liner was silent for 15 minutes, and then announced to the passengers that the ship had only minor problems with the generator. It was only almost an hour after the accident, when the ship tilted 30 degrees, that the emergency alarm sounded. The loading of people into the boats was accompanied by panic and stampede. Only the proximity of the coast made it possible to avoid a huge number of casualties.

Captain Schettino, according to investigators, was one of the first to leave the ship without sending a distress signal. The coast guard learned about the crash of the liner late and joined in the evacuation of people only late at night. The active phase of the rescue operation continued until the morning. Some passengers were ferried ashore by helicopter.

Passengers stranded on the island of Giglio were accommodated in a local church, school and other premises where there was at least some free space. Local residents helped the shipwrecked as best they could, bringing them food, blankets, and warm clothes. Meanwhile, rescuers did not stop working, trying to find people inside the ship, including in the underwater part in the air pockets that had formed. Their efforts were not unsuccessful: on January 14-15, two newlyweds from South Korea and one Italian crew member were found and rescued.

The disaster killed 32 people. The search for bodies continued for a long time - the remains of the most recent missing person were discovered only in November 2013. On February 1, 2014, another person was added to the mournful list - a diver died as a result of an accident while working to raise the vessel.

The Costa Concordia remained at the wreck site for two years and became a tourist attraction. A stream of tourists flocked to the island of Giglio. In the nearest town of San Stefano, located on the mainland, tour operators were doing business - selling tickets for excursions to the site of the tragedy. However, the inhabitants of the island were not happy with the hull of the ship, which became a grave. In addition, they feared that fuel and sewage would begin to leak from the airliner’s tanks. Therefore, they threatened Costa Crociere with legal action if the half-sunken ship was not removed in a timely manner.

There were about six thousand works of art on board the sunken liner. The most valuable of these is the rare collection of Japanese prints from the 18th-19th centuries, in particular by Katsushika Hokusai. The Costa Concordia also contained 19th-century Bohemian glass, antiques, jewelry from the ship's jewelry stores, and valuables and money left by passengers in cabins. Therefore, Coast Guard forces and carabinieri guarded the ship from attacks by looters. However, Italian media reported the theft of a ship's bell back in March 2012.

Work to pump 2,300 tons of fuel, oil and sewage from the tanks was completed on March 24, 2012. A month later, it was announced that the tender for work on lifting and evacuation of the vessel was won by the American company Titan Salvage. The operation was originally expected to take seven to ten months. In reality, it turned out much more, since a large amount of preparatory work was required. An underwater platform was built under the bottom of the ship, and special counterweight pontoons were installed on the left side, which, after filling with water, were supposed to put the liner on an even keel.

The 19-hour operation to straighten and lift the airliner was carried out on September 16-17, 2013. The vessel was placed on an even keel using 36 steel cables and counterweight pontoons. Then a platform with similar pontoons was brought to the starboard side. After draining all the pontoons, the skeleton of the Costa Concordia floated to the surface.

It is believed that the work performed was the most expensive in the history of rescue operations. Their cost was about 250 million euros.

The Costa Concordia remained off the island of Giglio for another 10 months, and only at the end of July 2014 was it towed for disposal to the shipyard in Sestri Ponente - where the ship was built 8 years ago. It was assumed that the work on cutting the hull into metal would take 22 months and end in the spring of 2016.

The court found the captain of the Costa Concordia, Francesco Schettino, to be the main and, in fact, the only culprit of the disaster. He was accused of negligence, involuntary manslaughter of 32 people and of abandoning his ship before all passengers were evacuated. However, Schettino denied many of the charges brought against him, showing miracles of resourcefulness. In particular, he argued that it was not he who was to blame for the deaths, but the unsatisfactory security system of the liner. He tried to shift the blame for the collision with the reef onto the Filipino helmsman, who allegedly, due to poor knowledge of the language, carried out commands too slowly... He explained his flight at the very beginning of the evacuation in court as follows: “I didn’t even have a life jacket because I gave it to one of the passengers. I tried to get the vest from the lifeboat, where they usually are. The ship suddenly tilted by about 60-70 degrees. I lost my footing and fell into one of the lifeboats. That's why I ended up there."

Tests for alcohol and drugs gave negative results, but Schettino, according to people who knew him, even when sober, was distinguished by indiscipline and recklessness unusual for his age (51 years old). One of his colleagues said: “He would even drive a bus like a Ferrari!”

On February 12, 2015, the Grosseto court found Schettino guilty and sentenced him to 16 years in prison.

The total damage from the death of the Costa Concordia for the shipowner was approximately 1.5 billion euros. And this, of course, does not take into account reputational losses.

In the photographs below you can compare the interiors of the liner - before the disaster and after two years under water:

In one second, a cruise can turn from a fantastic idyll into a nightmarish ordeal. Since 1980, 16 cruise ships have sunk worldwide, 99 have run aground since 1973, 79 ships have had fires since 1990, and 73 have suffered various other accidents. Since 2000, there have been more than 100 incidents of accidents in which the ship was left adrift on the high seas, deprived of energy, listing, almost capsizing, and many other incidents that posed a risk to the lives of passengers. Here are the worst cruise ship disasters of the last 100 years.

1. 100 years ago, on April 14, 1912, the luxury liner Titanic sank off the coast of Nova Scotia during its maiden voyage. The unsinkable Titanic set sail on April 10 and met its end in the form of an iceberg 4 days later, taking the lives of 1,513 passengers and crew members. But although negligence and pride led to the disaster, the captain and the cruise line should not be blamed for everything. Recent astrological studies revealed that in 1912 the Moon approached the Earth at its closest distance to Earth in 1,400 years, which led to increased currents that brought a large number of icebergs.

2. While cruising the St. Lawrence River, the Canadian passenger liner Empress of Ireland collided with the Norwegian coal carrier Storstad and sank 14 minutes later at a depth of more than 40 meters. The disaster claimed 1,012 lives and became the worst maritime disaster in Canadian history.

3. Laconia departed Southampton on December 19, 1963 for an 11-day Christmas cruise to the Canary Islands, carrying 1,022 people. On December 22, a steward saw smoke coming from under the door of a hair salon. The cabin was completely engulfed in flames, and the fire immediately spread to the corridor to the general cabins. The steward tried to control the fire with fire extinguishers, but the fire spread too quickly. 128 people died.

4. Security personnel in front of the Italian ship Achille Lauro on October 10, 1985 in the harbor of Port Said, after the Egyptian authorities prohibited it from sailing to the Israeli port of Ashdod. On October 7, 1985, four Palestinian Liberation Front terrorists led by Yusuf Majid al-Mulki and Abu Abbas hijacked a ship carrying 450 passengers. The terrorists killed one hostage - 69-year-old American Jew Leon Klinghoffer, a disabled person confined to a wheelchair. He was shot and thrown overboard in front of his wife Marilyn.

5. Tugboats move the damaged ocean liner Queen Elizabeth 2 into dry dock in Boston on August 12, 1992, after the ship ran aground during a cruise. No harm done.

6. The bow visor of the ferry Estonia is lifted from the bottom of the sea near the island of Utö in the Baltic Sea. The ship sank on the night of September 27–28, 1994, killing 852 of the 989 passengers and crew on board.

7. Aerial view of the Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro during a fire in the Indian Ocean. The Achille Lauro had already been captured by terrorists ten years earlier. Now, 30 miles east of the Horn of Africa, a fire broke out on the ship, which led to the death of 2 people.

8. The cruise ship "Norwegian Dream" at anchor in the southeast of England, after a collision with the Panamanian cargo ship "Ever Decent" on August 24, 1999. There were 2,400 people on the liner, of whom only three suffered injuries of varying severity.

9. A rescue helicopter over the cruise ship Seabreeze in distress on December 17, 2000, 320 kilometers off the coast of Virginia. The coast guard managed to evacuate all 34 crew members before the relentless waves of the Atlantic Ocean dragged the 200-meter vessel to the bottom.

10. The cruise ship Aurora in the port of Southampton, England on November 8, 2003, all 500 passengers suffered from acute digestive upset. Greece refused to help, and when the ship arrived in Gibraltar, Spain closed its borders until the ship abandoned it.

The cruise ship Sea Diamond evacuates passengers off the island of Santorini, Greece, April 5, 2007. The Greek Coast Guard carried out a large-scale operation to evacuate the ship's 1,200 passengers after it ran aground and then sank.

12. Life rafts from the Canadian cruise ship Explorer, which sank after colliding with an iceberg in Antarctic waters on November 23, 2007. 100 passengers and 54 crew members were rescued.

13. Cruise ship "Ecstasy" in the port of Miami on July 21, 2008. 60 people were injured as a result of a fire that broke out in the ship's laundry on July 20. The fire was extinguished and no evacuation was required.

14. Workers begin pumping diesel fuel from the Costa Concordia ship near the island of Giglio in the Mediterranean Sea on January 24, 2012. More than 4,000 people were on board at the time of the crash, of which 25 are now officially considered dead.

15. The Costa Allegra is being towed through the pirate-infested Indian Ocean after a fire on February 27 destroyed the air conditioning system, power supplies and damaged the engines. There were more than 1,000 people on board.