Titanic 2

Pretty unbelievable. When I saw the story earlier, I thought that that they would just evacuate, and tow her to repair.

Hope they find the unaccounted people soon, as this is now pretty serious.

Though this was going to be about Jim Camerons' upcoming re-release of Titanic 3D.

Unbelievable.

You'd think ships like that would have sophisticated navigation systems that would send up all sorts of alarms if it even comes close to something that could damage it like it did in this case. I'd also think that they would have well-defined courses pre-programmed into their nav systems.

Either the nav system was defective (no redundancy?) or someone was asleep at the wheel.

Of course I don't know anything about a cruise ship's nav system, but you'd think...

@BitFlipper: those aren't exactly uncharted waters... a collision with another vessel might be kind of justifiable if all the electronics went berserk, but hitting a rock is just ridicuolous (not in the funny sense).

What I'm hearing hints at gross incompetence and negligence. Hard to believe that something like this could happen to Costa.

From what I heard on the radio this morning the captain is up for manslaugther charges already. He was apparently trying to do some cute moves, show off to someone how close to shore they could get....or something like that.

9 minutes ago, Harlequin wrote

From what I heard on the radio this morning the captain is up for manslaugther charges already. He was apparently trying to do some cute moves, show off to someone how close to shore they could get....or something like that.

1. Boys will be boys.
2. What a moron!

It's starting to sound like the captain did everything wrong:

Steered to close to the island without permission.

Refused to abandon ship.

Refused to stay with with ship to oversee the evacuation.

Refused to go back to the ship when the coastguard ordered him to.

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/captain-ignored-orders-return-ship-012611215.html

I always thought that you had to have served as a naval officer before they let you take charge of a   thousand foot, quarter of million tonne, half a billion dollar pleasure dinghy.

When it comes to mortality here, it was dog eat dog. Is this really how far we have come?

1 minute ago, CaRDiaK wrote

When it comes to mortality here, it was dog eat dog. Is this really how far we have come?

Always difficult to know what any of us would do when faced with that situation. Hopefully... the right thing, which he (allegedly) did not.

This makes a case for HAL....Open the doors HAL.

The on-board navigation systems, ought to have triggered off several alarms, that he chose to override and ignore. If this was the case, then he is in big trouble, unless his crew were asleep, penitentiary will soon be a place they call home.

@Ray7:

Is true.

Apparently the captain was trying to show off (not sure who to), trying to see how close he could get to land.

I think this should become the new official definition of "Oops".

@BitFlipper:

Yep, it had done this before in the past, there's a video here: http://gcaptain.com/costa-concordia-showing-off/?37739

Only this time, the captain managed to crash the ship into an island.

@CreamFilling512: I still think that technology failed him (unless he ignored it), if you spot a lighthouse you know there is imminent danger thus steer away. That is unless he overrode the safety devices.

If so, then his bosses are to blame. Since he is "showing off" this has the net result of getting more customers excited about using the service. He should have been reprimanded the first time he showboated, the fact that this did not happen means the newspapers are trying to vilify someone in order to sell papers but the fault lies elsewhere. In a murder investigation, culpable Confederates are always sought, this tragedy is the fault of more than 1 person, including the vice-captain and all their management.

@vesuvius: Additionally the default reaction of any transport company in the face of a crash is to blame the driver/pilot/captain until evidence is provided to prove otherwise. Even the British MOD use this tactic when there's a crash in civilian airspace.

Herbie

7 hours ago, vesuvius wrote

@CreamFilling512: I still think that technology failed him (unless he ignored it), if you spot a lighthouse you know there is imminent danger thus steer away. That is unless he overrode the safety devices.

If so, then his bosses are to blame. Since he is "showing off" this has the net result of getting more customers excited about using the service. He should have been reprimanded the first time he showboated, the fact that this did not happen means the newspapers are trying to vilify someone in order to sell papers but the fault lies elsewhere. In a murder investigation, culpable Confederates are always sought, this tragedy is the fault of more than 1 person, including the vice-captain and all their management.

 

Well, apparently, his bosses had no idea he was showing off. The ship had been given permission to sail close to the island in the summer, which the ship's owners had to request. The other times he did it, was off his own back.

I take it ships don't have any way of logging the course they actually took as opposed to the one they were supposed to take?

I know some cargo ships continuously transmit their GPS position to the company that owns them, in case they get hijacked by pirates. I don't know if cruise ships do that, though.