A harrowing picture is emerging of the chaotic evacuation of more than 4,000 people from the luxury cruise ship that sank into the Mediterranean off the coast of Tuscany, killing at least three and leaving several others critically hurt.
As divers continued to search for possible missing or trapped passengers and crew of the Costa Concordia, survivors described scenes of total panic and confusion aboard as crew were at first unwilling then unable to launch lifeboats while the ship listed into the freezing sea. Survivors described climbing down ladders and ropes to escape.
Kirsty Cook, one of eight British dancers working on the cruise, said that she was "lucky to be alive" after using a rope ladder to climb down to a rescue boat. Another dancer, Rosie Metcalf, 22, from Dorset, had to cling to a fire hose before being winched to safety by a helicopter crew. The liner was only three hours out of port and passengers had not yet been given a safety drill. There was also confusion over some 50 to 70 people who were still unaccounted for, but the picture remained unclear as rescuers struggled to keep track of survivors who were being ferried to different ports.
By Saturday night the seven-year-old Costa Concordia lay almost flat on its side off the tiny island of Giglio, about 18 miles off the coast of Tuscany, with a 50m gash in its hull. The captain was praised by shipping experts for trying to bring his stricken vessel as close to shore as possible. But there was also anger about the lengthy delays in evacuating the £375m ship.
"The crew couldn't unhook the lifeboats," said Giuseppe D'Avino, a pastry cook from Modena, who eventually got aboard a boat after waiting for about an hour. "There was a lot of panic. There were people screaming. There were children bawling. And even some fisticuffs among the passengers."
A party of German survivors said the messages relayed to passengers were misleading. "It was just 'Not to worry. Not to worry'," said one.
Then, said a man who would give only his surname, Schmitz, passengers were left alone to queue for the lifeboats: "For more than three hours, we did not see any member of the crew."
Some passengers were apparently stranded on the lower decks of the ship. "I and my friends lifted up 13 or 14 people," Schmitz said. His friend, who also asked to be identified only by her surname of Gottschalk, said that she reached a lifeboat by lowering herself hand over hand down a rope.
As the ship listed to starboard, submerging almost half of the vessel, the lifeboats on that side became unusable and people leapt into the water. "Some of my colleagues had no option but to jump," said John Fernandes, 28, a waiter from Goa. "They were on the tilted side. They saw that the water was very close. They survived."
Usable lifeboats were then high above sea level. "We had to scream at the controllers to release the boats," said Mike van Dijk, 54, a South African. "We were standing in the corridors and they weren't allowing us to get on to the boats. It was an absolute scramble."
Nareen Faured, also from South Africa, said: "We were suspended for 45 minutes in the lifeboat in mid-air."
Other passengers did not know where their muster stations were. "It was so disorganised, our evacuation drill was scheduled for 5pm," said Melissa Goduti, 28, of Connecticut in the US. "We had joked what if something had happened today." Waiting for up to three hours for rescue, passengers were cold and traumatised. Five Italian military and coastguard helicopters joined local fishing boats in the area to help pluck survivors to safety.
"Have you seen Titanic? That's exactly what it was like," said Valerie Ananias, 31, a schoolteacher from Los Angeles who was with her sister and parents. "They all had dark red bruises from crawling up corridors that were nearly vertical."
"We were crawling up a hallway, in the dark, with only the light from the life vest flashing," her mother, Georgia Ananias, 61, said. "We could hear plates and dishes crashing, people slamming against walls."
She said that an Argentinian couple had handed her their baby daughter, unable to keep their balance as the ship lurched. They were left standing on a wall, unable to crawl further.
"He said 'take my baby'," Ananias said, sobbing. "I grabbed her, but then I was being pushed down. I didn't want the baby to fall down the stairs. I gave the baby back. I thought that was the end and that they should be with their baby."
Valerie whispered "I wonder where they are?"
The family were some of the last off the ship, shimmying along a rope down the exposed side of the ship to a waiting boat.
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