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The Costa Concordia Disaster: How Human Error Made It Worse

By: Becky Little

Updated: August 10, 2023 | Original: June 23, 2021

Many famous naval disasters happen far out at sea, but on January 13, 2012, the Costa Concordia wrecked just off the coast of an Italian island in relatively shallow water. The avoidable disaster killed 32 people and seriously injured many others, and left investigators wondering: Why was the luxury cruise ship sailing so close to the shore in the first place?

During the ensuing trial, prosecutors came up with a tabloid-ready explanation : The married ship captain had sailed it so close to the island to impress a much younger Moldovan dancer with whom he was having an affair.

Whether or not Captain Francesco Schettino was trying to impress his girlfriend is debatable. (Schettino insisted the ship sailed close to shore to salute other mariners and give passengers a good view.) But whatever the reason for getting too close, the Italian courts found the captain, four crew members and one official from the ship’s company, Costa Crociere (part of Carnival Corporation), to be at fault for causing the disaster and preventing a safe evacuation. The wreck was not the fault of unexpected weather or ship malfunction—it was a disaster caused entirely by a series of human errors.

“At any time when you have an incident similar to Concordia, there is never…a single causal factor,” says Brad Schoenwald, a senior marine inspector at the United States Coast Guard. “It is generally a sequence of events, things that line up in a bad way that ultimately create that incident.”

Wrecking Near the Shore

The Concordia was supposed to take passengers on a seven-day Italian cruise from Civitavecchia to Savona. But when it deviated from its planned path to sail closer to the island of Giglio, the ship struck a reef known as the Scole Rocks. The impact damaged the ship, allowing water to seep in and putting the 4,229 people on board in danger.

Sailing close to shore to give passengers a nice view or salute other sailors is known as a “sail-by,” and it’s unclear how often cruise ships perform these maneuvers. Some consider them to be dangerous deviations from planned routes. In its investigative report on the 2012 disaster, Italy’s Ministry of Infrastructures and Transports found that the Concordia “was sailing too close to the coastline, in a poorly lit shore area…at an unsafe distance at night time and at high speed (15.5 kts).”

In his trial, Captain Schettino blamed the shipwreck on Helmsman Jacob Rusli Bin, who he claimed reacted incorrectly to his order; and argued that if the helmsman had reacted correctly and quickly, the ship wouldn’t have wrecked. However, an Italian naval admiral testified in court that even though the helmsman was late in executing the captain’s orders, “the crash would’ve happened anyway.” (The helmsman was one of the four crew members convicted in court for contributing to the disaster.)

A Questionable Evacuation

Evidence introduced in Schettino’s trial suggests that the safety of his passengers and crew wasn’t his number one priority as he assessed the damage to the Concordia. The impact and water leakage caused an electrical blackout on the ship, and a recorded phone call with Costa Crociere’s crisis coordinator, Roberto Ferrarini, shows he tried to downplay and cover up his actions by saying the blackout was what actually caused the accident.

“I have made a mess and practically the whole ship is flooding,” Schettino told Ferrarini while the ship was sinking. “What should I say to the media?… To the port authorities I have said that we had…a blackout.” (Ferrarini was later convicted for contributing to the disaster by delaying rescue operations.)

Schettino also didn’t immediately alert the Italian Search and Rescue Authority about the accident. The impact on the Scole Rocks occurred at about 9:45 p.m. local time, and the first person to contact rescue officials about the ship was someone on the shore, according to the investigative report. Search and Rescue contacted the ship a few minutes after 10:00 p.m., but Schettino didn’t tell them what had happened for about 20 more minutes.

A little more than an hour after impact, the crew began to evacuate the ship. But the report noted that some passengers testified that they didn’t hear the alarm to proceed to the lifeboats. Evacuation was made even more chaotic by the ship listing so far to starboard, making walking inside very difficult and lowering the lifeboats on one side, near to impossible. Making things worse, the crew had dropped the anchor incorrectly, causing the ship to flop over even more dramatically.

Through the confusion, the captain somehow made it into a lifeboat before everyone else had made it off. A coast guard member angrily told him on the phone to “Get back on board, damn it!” —a recorded sound bite that turned into a T-shirt slogan in Italy.

Schettino argued that he fell into a lifeboat because of how the ship was listing to one side, but this argument proved unconvincing. In 2015, a court found Schettino guilty of manslaughter, causing a shipwreck, abandoning ship before passengers and crew were evacuated and lying to authorities about the disaster. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison. In addition to Schettino, Ferrarini and Rusli Bin, the other people who received convictions for their role in the disaster were Cabin Service Director Manrico Giampedroni, First Officer Ciro Ambrosio and Third Officer Silvia Coronica.

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10 years later, Costa Concordia disaster is still vivid for survivors

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Ten years have passed since the Costa Concordia cruise ship slammed into a reef and capsized off the Tuscan island of Giglio . But for the passengers on board and the residents who welcomed them ashore, the memories of that harrowing, freezing night remain vividly etched into their minds.

The dinner plates that flew off the tables when the rocks first gashed the hull. The blackout after the ship’s engine room flooded and its generators failed. The final mad scramble to evacuate the listing liner and then the extraordinary generosity of Giglio islanders who offered shoes, sweatshirts and shelter until the sun rose and passengers were ferried to the mainland.

Italy on Thursday is marking the 10th anniversary of the Concordia disaster with a daylong commemoration that will end with a candlelit vigil near the moment the ship hit the reef: 9:45 p.m. on Jan. 13, 2012. The events will honor the 32 people who died that night, the 4,200 survivors, but also the residents of Giglio, who took in passengers and crew and then lived with the Concordia’s wrecked carcass off their shore for another two years until it was righted and hauled away for scrap.

“For us islanders, when we remember some event, we always refer to whether it was before or after the Concordia,” said Matteo Coppa, who was 23 and fishing on the jetty when the darkened Concordia listed toward shore and then collapsed onto its side in the water.

“I imagine it like a nail stuck to the wall that marks that date, as a before and after,” he said, recounting how he joined the rescue effort that night, helping pull ashore the dazed, injured and freezing passengers from lifeboats.

The sad anniversary comes as the cruise industry, shut down in much of the world for months because of the coronavirus pandemic, is once again in the spotlight because of COVID-19 outbreaks that threaten passenger safety. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control last month warned people across-the-board not to go on cruises , regardless of their vaccination status, because of the risks of infection.

A dozen passengers on cruise ship test positive for coronavirus

The passengers, whose infections were found through random testing, were asymptomatic or had mild symptoms, according to the Port of San Francisco.

Jan. 7, 2022

For Concordia survivor Georgia Ananias, the COVID-19 infections are just the latest evidence that passenger safety still isn’t a top priority for the cruise ship industry. Passengers aboard the Concordia were largely left on their own to find life jackets and a functioning lifeboat after the captain steered the ship close too shore in a stunt. He then delayed an evacuation order until it was too late, with lifeboats unable to lower because the ship was listing too heavily.

“I always said this will not define me, but you have no choice,” Ananias said in an interview from her home in Los Angeles. “We all suffer from PTSD. We had a lot of guilt that we survived and 32 other people died.”

Prosecutors blamed the delayed evacuation order and conflicting instructions given by crew for the chaos that ensued as passengers scrambled to get off the ship. The captain, Francesco Schettino, is serving a 16-year prison sentence for manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning a ship before all the passengers and crew had evacuated.

Ananias and her family declined Costa’s initial $14,500 compensation offered to each passenger and sued Costa, a unit of U.S.-based Carnival Corp., to try to cover the cost of their medical bills and therapy for the post-traumatic stress they have suffered. But after eight years in the U.S. and then Italian court system, they lost their case.

“I think people need to be aware that when you go on a cruise, that if there is a problem, you will not have the justice that you may be used to in the country in which you are living,” said Ananias, who went onto become a top official in the International Cruise Victims association, an advocacy group that lobbies to improve safety aboard ships and increase transparency and accountability in the industry.

Costa didn’t respond to emails seeking comment on the anniversary.

Cruise Lines International Assn., the world’s largest cruise industry trade association, stressed in a statement to the Associated Press that passenger and crew safety were the industry’s top priority, and that cruising remains one of the safest vacation experiences available.

“Our thoughts continue to be with the victims of the Concordia tragedy and their families on this sad anniversary,” CLIA said. It said it has worked over the past 10 years with the International Maritime Organization and the maritime industry to “drive a safety culture that is based on continuous improvement.”

For Giglio Mayor Sergio Ortelli, the memories of that night run the gamut: the horror of seeing the capsized ship, the scramble to coordinate rescue services on shore, the recovery of the first bodies and then the pride that islanders rose to the occasion to tend to the survivors.

Ortelli was later on hand when, in September 2013, the 115,000-ton, 1,000-foot long cruise ship was righted vertical off its seabed graveyard in an extraordinary feat of engineering. But the night of the disaster, a Friday the 13th, remains seared in his memory.

“It was a night that, in addition to being a tragedy, had a beautiful side because the response of the people was a spontaneous gesture that was appreciated around the world,” Ortelli said.

It seemed the natural thing to do at the time. “But then we realized that on that night, in just a few hours, we did something incredible.”

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10 years later, Costa Concordia survivors share their stories from doomed cruise ship

Ten years after the deadly Costa Concordia cruise line disaster in Italy, survivors still vividly remember scenes of chaos they say were like something straight out of the movie "Titanic."

NBC News correspondent Kelly Cobiella caught up with a group of survivors on TODAY Wednesday, a decade after they escaped a maritime disaster that claimed the lives of 32 people. The Italian cruise ship ran aground off the tiny Italian island of Giglio after striking an underground rock and capsizing.

"I think it’s the panic, the feeling of panic, is what’s carried through over 10 years," Ian Donoff, who was on the cruise with his wife Janice for their honeymoon, told Cobiella. "And it’s just as strong now."

More than 4,000 passengers and crew were on board when the ship crashed into rocks in the dark in the Mediterranean Sea, sending seawater rushing into the vessel as people scrambled for their lives.

The ship's captain, Francesco Schettino, had been performing a sail-past salute of Giglio when he steered the ship too close to the island and hit the jagged reef, opening a 230-foot gash in the side of the cruise liner.

Passengers struggled to escape in the darkness, clambering to get to the life boats. Alaska resident Nate Lukes was with his wife, Cary, and their four daughters aboard the ship and remembers the chaos that ensued as the ship started to sink.

"There was really a melee there is the best way to describe it," he told Cobiella. "It's very similar to the movie 'Titanic.' People were jumping onto the top of the lifeboats and pushing down women and children to try to get to them."

The lifeboats wouldn't drop down because the ship was tilted on its side, leaving hundreds of passengers stranded on the side of the ship for hours in the cold. People were left to clamber down a rope ladder over a distance equivalent to 11 stories.

"Everybody was rushing for the lifeboats," Nate Lukes said. "I felt like (my daughters) were going to get trampled, and putting my arms around them and just holding them together and letting the sea of people go by us."

Schettino was convicted of multiple manslaughter as well as abandoning ship after leaving before all the passengers had reached safety. He is now serving a 16-year prison sentence .

It took nearly two years for the damaged ship to be raised from its side before it was towed away to be scrapped.

The calamity caused changes in the cruise industry like carrying more lifejackets and holding emergency drills before leaving port.

A decade after that harrowing night, the survivors are grateful to have made it out alive. None of the survivors who spoke with Cobiella have been on a cruise since that day.

"I said that if we survive this, then our marriage will have to survive forever," Ian Donoff said.

Scott Stump is a trending reporter and the writer of the daily newsletter This is TODAY (which you should subscribe to here! ) that brings the day's news, health tips, parenting stories, recipes and a daily delight right to your inbox. He has been a regular contributor for TODAY.com since 2011, producing features and news for pop culture, parents, politics, health, style, food and pretty much everything else. 

Ten years on, Costa Concordia shipwreck still haunts survivors, islanders

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Philip Pullella reported from Rome; Additional reporting by Yara Nardi, writing by Philip Pullella; Editing by Emelia Sithole-Matarise

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Trending Today

The Wrecked Costa Concordia Cruise Ship Is Finally Being Towed Away

The ship’s remains will be broken down for scrap metal

Rachel Nuwer

The MS Costa Concordia , the Italian cruise ship that killed 32 people when it sank off the coast off Isola del Giglio in 2012, has just been sitting off the Tuscan coast ever since. This morning, though, the ship was successfully refloated, the Guardian reports . Environmentalists are relieved since the ship has been marring a marine sanctuary for more than two years, while local residents say they are looking forward to no longer having to see a giant wreck each time they look out to sea. 

Removing the ship entirely, however, will be no easy task. For starters, it's twice as big as the RMS Titanic , the Guardian  points out. So far, however, the plan seems to be working: 

Air was pumped slowly into 30 tanks or "sponsons" attached to both sides of the 290-metre, 114,500-tonne Concordia to expel the water inside, raising it two metres (6.5 feet) off the artificial platform it has rested on since it was righted in September. It will now be towed away from the shore and moored using anchors and cables. Thirty-six steel cables and 56 chains will hold the sponsons in place.

There are going to be substantial risks before the Costa Concordia is gone for good ,  however. As CNN writes , the ship's rotting hull could break off as it is jostled about, which would cause lengthy delays. Or, it could just fall apart entirely. "The worst case scenario is that the ship falls apart during the first six hours as it's raised off the platform -- or that it breaks up somewhere off the coast of Corsica, which is where the Mediterranean's currents are the strongest," CNN continues. Some environmental groups, like Greenpeace, are also concerned that the Costa Concordia will leave a trail of leaky toxic waste in its wake, CNN adds. 

The Costa Concordia 's planned final destination is Genoa, Italy, where it will be broken down into scrap metal. Experts estimate that that process could take as long as two-and-a-half years, CNN writes. 

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Rachel Nuwer | | READ MORE

Rachel Nuwer is a freelance science writer based in Brooklyn.

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Costa Concordia: Italy marks ten years since cruise ship disaster

Thirty-two people died when the ship slammed into a reef and capsized off the Tuscan island of Giglio.

Italy will mark the 10th anniversary of the Costa Concordia cruise ship disaster on Thursday with a daylong commemoration.

The events will end with a candlelight vigil at 9:45 pm when the ship hit the reef.

It will also honour the 4,200 survivors and the residents of Giglio who took in passengers and crew, offering clothes and shelter until passengers could return to the mainland.

"For us islanders, when we remember some event, we always refer to whether it was before or after the Concordia," said Matteo Coppa, who was 23 and fishing on the jetty when the darkened Concordia listed toward shore and then collapsed onto its side in the water.

"I imagine it like a nail stuck to the wall that marks that date, as a before and after," he said, recounting how he joined the rescue effort that night, helping pull ashore the dazed, injured and freezing passengers from lifeboats.

The boat would stay off the coast of the island for another ten years until being removed in 2014.

The anniversary comes as the cruise industry, shut down in much of the world for months because of the COVID-19 pandemic, is once again in the spotlight because of virus outbreaks that threaten passenger safety.

For Concordia survivor Georgia Ananias, the COVID-19 infections are just the latest evidence that passenger safety still isn’t a top priority for the cruise ship industry.

“I always said this will not define me, but you have no choice," Ananias said in an interview from her home in Los Angeles, Calif. “We all suffer from PTSD. We had a lot of guilt that we survived and 32 other people died.”

Prosecutors blamed a delayed evacuation order and conflicting instructions given by crew for the chaos that ensued as passengers scrambled to get off the ship.

The captain, Francesco Schettino, is serving a 16-year prison sentence for manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning a ship before all the passengers and crew had evacuated.

Ananias and her family declined Costa’s initial $14,500 compensation offered to each passenger and sued Costa, a unit of US-based Carnival Corp., to try to cover the cost of their medical bills and therapy for the post-traumatic stress they have suffered. But after eight years in the US and then Italian court system, they lost their case.

“I think people need to be aware that when you go on a cruise, that if there is a problem, you will not have the justice that you may be used to in the country in which you are living,” said Ananias, who went onto become a top official in the International Cruise Victims association, an advocacy group that lobbies to improve safety aboard ships and increase transparency and accountability in the industry.

Costa didn’t respond to emails seeking comment on the anniversary.

Cruise Lines International Association, the world’s largest cruise industry trade association, stressed in a statement to The Associated Press that passenger and crew safety was the industry's top priority, and that cruising remains one of the safest vacation experiences available.

“Our thoughts continue to be with the victims of the Concordia tragedy and their families on this sad anniversary," CLIA said. It said it has worked over the past 10 years with the International Maritime Organisation and the maritime industry to “drive a safety culture that is based on continuous improvement."

For Giglio Mayor Sergio Ortelli, the memories of that night run the gamut: the horror of seeing the capsized ship, the scramble to coordinate rescue services on shore, the recovery of the first bodies and then the pride that islanders rose to the occasion to tend to the survivors.

Ortelli was later on hand when, in September 2013, the 115,000-ton, 300-metre long cruise ship was righted vertical off its seabed graveyard in an extraordinary feat of engineering. But the night of the disaster, a Friday the 13th, remains seared in his memory.

“It was a night that, in addition to being a tragedy, had a beautiful side because the response of the people was a spontaneous gesture that was appreciated around the world,” Ortelli said.

It seemed the natural thing to do at the time. “But then we realised that on that night, in just a few hours, we did something incredible.”

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10 years later, Costa Concordia disaster vivid for survivors

FILE — The luxury cruise ship Costa Concordia lays on its starboard side after it ran aground off the coast of the Isola del Giglio island, Italy on Jan. 13, 2012. Italy is marking the 10th anniversary of the Concordia disaster with a daylong commemoration, honoring the 32 people who died but also the extraordinary response by the residents of Giglio who took in the 4,200 passengers and crew from the ship on that rainy Friday night and then lived with the Concordia carcass for another two years before it was hauled away for scrap. (AP Photo/Giuseppe Modesti)

FILE— The grounded cruise ship Costa Concordia is seen through a window on the Isola del Giglio island, Italy, Friday, Feb. 3, 2012. Italy on Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022, is marking the 10th anniversary of the Concordia disaster with a daylong commemoration, honoring the 32 people who died but also the extraordinary response by the residents of Giglio who took in the 4,200 passengers and crew from the ship on that rainy Friday night and then lived with the Concordia carcass for another two years before it was hauled away for scrap. (AP Photo/Pier Paolo Cito)

FILE— Oil removal ships near the cruise ship Costa Concordia leaning on its side Monday, Jan. 16, 2012, after running aground near the tiny Tuscan island of Giglio, Italy, last Friday night. Italy on Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022, is marking the 10th anniversary of the Concordia disaster with a daylong commemoration, honoring the 32 people who died but also the extraordinary response by the residents of Giglio who took in the 4,200 passengers and crew from the ship on that rainy Friday night and then lived with the Concordia carcass for another two years before it was hauled away for scrap. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

FILE— The Costa Concordia ship lies on its side on the Tuscan island of Isola del Giglio, Italy, Monday, Sept. 16, 2013. Italy on Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022, is marking the 10th anniversary of the Concordia disaster with a daylong commemoration, honoring the 32 people who died but also the extraordinary response by the residents of Giglio who took in the 4,200 passengers and crew from the ship on that rainy Friday night and then lived with the Concordia carcass for another two years before it was hauled away for scrap. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)

FILE— A sunbather gets her tan on a rock during the operations to refloat the luxury cruise ship Costa Concordia on the tiny Tuscan island of Isola del Giglio, Italy, Saturday, July 19, 2014. Once the ship has refloated it will be towed to Genoa’s port, about 200 nautical miles (320 kilometers), where it will be dismantled. 30 months ago it struck a reef and capsized, killing 32 people. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

FILE— The wrecked hulk of the Costa Concordia cruise ship is towed along the Tyrrhenian Sea, 30 miles off the coast of Viareggio, Italy, Friday, July 25, 2014. Italy on Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022, is marking the 10th anniversary of the Concordia disaster with a daylong commemoration, honoring the 32 people who died but also the extraordinary response by the residents of Giglio who took in the 4,200 passengers and crew from the ship on that rainy Friday night and then lived with the Concordia carcass for another two years before it was hauled away for scrap. (AP Photo/Fabio Muzzi)

FILE— A view of the previously submerged side of the Costa Concordia cruise ship, off the coast of the Tuscan Island of Giglio, Italy, Monday, Jan. 13, 2014. Italy on Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022, is marking the 10th anniversary of the Concordia disaster with a daylong commemoration, honoring the 32 people who died but also the extraordinary response by the residents of Giglio who took in the 4,200 passengers and crew from the ship on that rainy Friday night and then lived with the Concordia carcass for another two years before it was hauled away for scrap. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

FILE— A passenger from South Korea, center, walks with Italian Firefighters, Sunday, Jan. 15, 2012, after being rescued from the luxury cruise ship Costa Concordia which ran aground on the tiny Italian island of Isola del Giglio. Italy on Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022, is marking the 10th anniversary of the Concordia disaster with a daylong commemoration, honoring the 32 people who died but also the extraordinary response by the residents of Giglio who took in the 4,200 passengers and crew from the ship on that rainy Friday night and then lived with the Concordia carcass for another two years before it was hauled away for scrap. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

FILE— A woman hangs her laundry as the grounded cruise ship Costa Concordia is seen in the background, off the Tuscan island of Isola del Giglio, Italy, Saturday, Jan. 21, 2012. Italy on Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022, is marking the 10th anniversary of the Concordia disaster with a daylong commemoration, honoring the 32 people who died but also the extraordinary response by the residents of Giglio who took in the 4,200 passengers and crew from the ship on that rainy Friday night and then lived with the Concordia carcass for another two years before it was hauled away for scrap.(AP Photo/Pier Paolo Cito)

FILE— In this photo taken on Saturday, Jan. 14, 2012, Francesco Schettino, right, the captain of the luxury cruise ship Costa Concordia, which ran aground off the tiny Tuscan island of Isola del Giglio, is taken into custody by Carabinieri in Porto Santo Stefano, Italy. Italy on Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022, is marking the 10th anniversary of the Concordia disaster with a daylong commemoration, honoring the 32 people who died but also the extraordinary response by the residents of Giglio who took in the 4,200 passengers and crew from the ship on that rainy Friday night and then lived with the Concordia carcass for another two years before it was hauled away for scrap. (AP Photo/Giacomo Aprili)

Experts aboard a sea platform carry oil recovery equipment, Saturday, Jan. 28, 2012, as they return to the port of the Tuscan island of Giglio, Italy, where the cruise ship Costa Concordia, visible in background, ran aground on Ja. 13, 2012. Italy on Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022, is marking the 10th anniversary of the Concordia disaster with a daylong commemoration, honoring the 32 people who died but also the extraordinary response by the residents of Giglio who took in the 4,200 passengers and crew from the ship on that rainy Friday night and then lived with the Concordia carcass for another two years before it was hauled away for scrap. (AP Photo/Pier Paolo Cito)

FILE— Seagulls fly in front of the grounded cruise ship Costa Concordia off the Tuscan island of Isola del Giglio, Italy, Monday, Jan. 30, 2012. Italy on Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022, is marking the 10th anniversary of the Concordia disaster with a daylong commemoration, honoring the 32 people who died but also the extraordinary response by the residents of Giglio who took in the 4,200 passengers and crew from the ship on that rainy Friday night and then lived with the Concordia carcass for another two years before it was hauled away for scrap. (AP Photo/Pier Paolo Cito)

FILE— Italian firefighters conduct search operations on the luxury cruise ship Costa Concordia that ran aground the tiny Tuscan island of Isola del Giglio, Italy, Sunday, Jan. 15, 2012. Italy on Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022, is marking the 10th anniversary of the Concordia disaster with a daylong commemoration, honoring the 32 people who died but also the extraordinary response by the residents of Giglio who took in the 4,200 passengers and crew from the ship on that rainy Friday night and then lived with the Concordia carcass for another two years before it was hauled away for scrap. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

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GIGLIO, Italy (AP) — Ten years have passed since the Costa Concordia cruise ship slammed into a reef and capsized off the Tuscan island of Giglio. But for the passengers on board and the residents who welcomed them ashore, the memories of that harrowing, freezing night remain vividly etched into their minds.

The dinner plates that flew off the tables when the rocks first gashed the hull. The blackout after the ship’s engine room flooded and its generators failed. The final mad scramble to evacuate the listing liner and then the extraordinary generosity of Giglio islanders who offered shoes, sweatshirts and shelter until the sun rose and passengers were ferried to the mainland.

Italy on Thursday is marking the 10th anniversary of the Concordia disaster with a daylong commemoration that will end with a candlelit vigil near the moment the ship hit the reef: 9:45 p.m. on Jan. 13, 2012. The events will honor the 32 people who died that night, the 4,200 survivors, but also the residents of Giglio, who took in passengers and crew and then lived with the Concordia’s wrecked carcass off their shore for another two years until it was righted and hauled away for scrap.

“For us islanders, when we remember some event, we always refer to whether it was before or after the Concordia,” said Matteo Coppa, who was 23 and fishing on the jetty when the darkened Concordia listed toward shore and then collapsed onto its side in the water.

“I imagine it like a nail stuck to the wall that marks that date, as a before and after,” he said, recounting how he joined the rescue effort that night, helping pull ashore the dazed, injured and freezing passengers from lifeboats.

The sad anniversary comes as the cruise industry, shut down in much of the world for months because of the coronavirus pandemic, is once again in the spotlight because of COVID-19 outbreaks that threaten passenger safety. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control last month warned people across-the-board not to go on cruises , regardless of their vaccination status, because of the risks of infection.

For Concordia survivor Georgia Ananias, the COVID-19 infections are just the latest evidence that passenger safety still isn’t a top priority for the cruise ship industry. Passengers aboard the Concordia were largely left on their own to find life jackets and a functioning lifeboat after the captain steered the ship close too shore in a stunt. He then delayed an evacuation order until it was too late, with lifeboats unable to lower because the ship was listing too heavily.

“I always said this will not define me, but you have no choice,” Ananias said in an interview from her home in Los Angeles, Calif. “We all suffer from PTSD. We had a lot of guilt that we survived and 32 other people died.”

Prosecutors blamed the delayed evacuation order and conflicting instructions given by crew for the chaos that ensued as passengers scrambled to get off the ship. The captain, Francesco Schettino, is serving a 16-year prison sentence for manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning a ship before all the passengers and crew had evacuated.

Ananias and her family declined Costa’s initial $14,500 compensation offered to each passenger and sued Costa, a unit of U.S.-based Carnival Corp., to try to cover the cost of their medical bills and therapy for the post-traumatic stress they have suffered. But after eight years in the U.S. and then Italian court system, they lost their case.

“I think people need to be aware that when you go on a cruise, that if there is a problem, you will not have the justice that you may be used to in the country in which you are living,” said Ananias, who went onto become a top official in the International Cruise Victims association, an advocacy group that lobbies to improve safety aboard ships and increase transparency and accountability in the industry.

Costa didn’t respond to emails seeking comment on the anniversary.

Cruise Lines International Association, the world’s largest cruise industry trade association, stressed in a statement to The Associated Press that passenger and crew safety was the industry’s top priority, and that cruising remains one of the safest vacation experiences available.

“Our thoughts continue to be with the victims of the Concordia tragedy and their families on this sad anniversary,” CLIA said. It said it has worked over the past 10 years with the International Maritime Organization and the maritime industry to “drive a safety culture that is based on continuous improvement.”

For Giglio Mayor Sergio Ortelli, the memories of that night run the gamut: the horror of seeing the capsized ship, the scramble to coordinate rescue services on shore, the recovery of the first bodies and then the pride that islanders rose to the occasion to tend to the survivors.

Ortelli was later on hand when, in September 2013, the 115,000-ton, 300-meter (1,000-foot) long cruise ship was righted vertical off its seabed graveyard in an extraordinary feat of engineering. But the night of the disaster, a Friday the 13th, remains seared in his memory.

“It was a night that, in addition to being a tragedy, had a beautiful side because the response of the people was a spontaneous gesture that was appreciated around the world,” Ortelli said.

It seemed the natural thing to do at the time. “But then we realized that on that night, in just a few hours, we did something incredible.”

Winfield reported from Rome.

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Captain of Ship That Capsized Off Italy in ’12 Is Convicted

By Gaia Pianigiani

• Feb. 11, 2015

ROME — An Italian court on Wednesday convicted the captain of a cruise liner that capsized in 2012 , killing 32 people, of manslaughter and sentenced him to just over 16 years in prison for his role in one of the worst maritime disasters in modern Italian history.

The captain, Francesco Schettino, 54, was convicted of multiple counts of manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning the vessel, the Costa Concordia, before all of its 4,229 passengers and crew members had been evacuated. The court also barred him from commanding a ship for five years and from ever holding public office.

The captain’s lawyers said they would appeal the verdict. Captain Schettino will remain free in the meantime; under Italian law, the appeals process can take years to resolve. The captain was not in the courtroom when the verdict was read.

Prosecutors in the Tuscan town of Grosseto, where the trial was held, had sought a sentence of more than 26 years for Captain Schettino , whom they held responsible for sailing too close to shore and hitting a submerged rock off the island of Giglio, and for not promptly ordering the ship’s evacuation.

Francesco Pope, one of Captain Schettino’s lawyers, called the prosecutors’ sentencing request “enormous” in a telephone interview after the verdict was announced. “I’d only like to point out that the judges reduced that by almost half,” he said.

In closing arguments that went on for days, prosecutors attacked Captain Schettino’s conduct on the night of the shipwreck, calling him a “reckless idiot” and accusing him of making deadly mistakes and lying to passengers, maritime authorities and rescue officials.

One of the prosecutors, Alessandro Leopizzi, noted how the captain had managed to reach Giglio safely, “without even getting his feet wet,” while passengers remained on the tilting ship. In taped conversations from that night , the captain told a coast guard official that he had tripped onto a lifeboat before the evacuation was completed.

Although Captain Schettino acknowledged some responsibility for the disaster during the trial, he defended the decisions he made, such as not dropping the anchor soon after the ship struck the rock. He also said he delayed sounding an alarm to prevent greater panic among the passengers.

“I was put in a media meat grinder,” Captain Schettino said in his final remarks to the court before the verdict was read Wednesday. “That has put the entire responsibility for this incident on to me, with no respect for the truth.”

He maintained in court that he had saved lives by steering the cruise liner toward the coast. In defending his actions, the captain said his orders were not executed correctly by his crew, including an Indonesian helmsman who veered the ship in the opposite direction. Captain Schettino also cited technical malfunctions.

Several passengers told the court about various equipment failures in the chaotic hours after the impact, including a faulty emergency generator, as well as mistakes made by other crew members, some of whom spoke neither Italian nor English.

The court also ordered Captain Schettino and the company that operated the ship, Costa Cruises, to pay damages of 30,000 euros, or about $34,000, in compensation to each passenger, and several million euros to local and national government bodies for the environmental harm caused by the accident.

Captain Schettino was the only defendant in the trial. Five other employees of Costa Cruises who were indicted in the case were allowed to make plea deals in the early stages of the proceedings; none are serving prison time.

The company has already paid €1 million in administrative sanctions in connection with the disaster, and it offered in January to settle with each uninjured passenger for about $14,400.

Under Italian law, companies can be held responsible for their employees’ conduct, but the ship’s operator was not indicted in the case. Costa Cruises is controlled by the Carnival Corporation.

The 19-month trial was held in a theater because of the large number of people involved, including hundreds of witnesses who discussed complicated technical details.

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COSTA CONCORDIA DISASTER EXPLAINED: WATCH THE WORLD EXCLUSIVE, FIRST IN-DEPTH TELEVISION INTERVIEW WITH THE SHIP'S CAPTAIN ON CBC NEWS' the fifth estate

It’s been nearly a year since the Costa Concordia cruise ship struck a rock and sank off the coast of Italy, leaving 32 passengers and crew dead. The captain’s been charged with manslaughter, and now the biggest salvage operation in history—of the largest Italian ship ever built—is under way. And this Friday on the fifth estate , watch the world exclusive, first in-depth television interview with Captain Francesco Schettino, as he tells his version of the story of what happened that fateful night. Bob McKeown sheds new light on the disaster, with black box recordings and never-before-made-public coast guard radio communications, detailing events unfolding on the doomed ship before, during and after the crash.

Costa Concordia: The Captain’s Tale airs on CBC News’ the fifth estate, Friday, Dec. 7 at 9 p.m. (9:30 NT) on CBC-TV.

Why did the captain not tell everyone to immediately abandon ship? Why did he leave the vessel before everyone else was safely off? And how are the Italians dealing with the wrecked Costa Concordia off the Tuscan coast? “We were forced to go. Otherwise we would have died,” says Schettino. On the fifth estate , hear the first-hand account from the captain about why he did what he did, and updates from the scene of the wreckage.

Last season, the fifth estate presented a minute-by-minute reconstruction of The Wreck of the Costa Concordia , featuring first-hand accounts of the disaster along with never-before-seen footage. Now, the fifth estate tells the inside story of how it happened and why so many people died in one of the most shocking marine accidents in modern memory.

In advance of the broadcast, watch Costa: Concordia: The Captain’s Tale online, for review purposes only, by contacting Corey Black ( [email protected] ) for the link and password. CBC News Network rebroadcasts the fifth estate on Saturdays at 8 p.m. ET and Sundays at 7 p.m. ET. For more information on the fifth estate , visit our website at www.cbc.ca/fifth , join us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter . Executive producer of the fifth estate is Jim Williamson.

To view past episodes of the fifth estate , and other CBC programming, visit CBC Player , download the CBC App for your mobile devices, and download CBC podcasts .

CBC’s brand new team of in-house publicists are delivering a comprehensive publicity service for all CBC programming and events. For a complete list of publicity contacts and for more information including series synopses, press releases, hi-res images, video clips and bios, please visit the new CBC Media Centre at cbc.ca/mediacentre .

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Costa Concordia captain Francesco Schettino guilty of manslaughter

Skipper of cruise ship that sank off coast of Italy in 2012 killing 32 people has been sentenced to total of 16 years in jail

The captain of the Costa Concordia , the cruise ship that ran aground off the coast of Italy in 2012 killing 32 people, has been found guilty of manslaughter.

It was the most serious charge facing Francesco Schettino , who was sentenced to 16 years in jail – 10 years less than prosecutors had sought.

The disgraced commander, who was dubbed “Captain Coward” after it emerged that he abandoned the sinking ship even as hundreds of panicking passengers awaited rescue, was not present for the reading of the verdict by a panel of three judges.

He was also found guilty of causing the wreck and of deserting his post, but he escaped immediate arrest and will remain free pending his appeal.

It could take years for the man that prosecutors called a “reckless idiot” to begin serving his sentence, if ever, given Italy’s notoriously lengthy appeal process.

The ruling came just hours after Schettino made a tearful final plea for leniency, telling the court that he had “partly died” on the day of the wreck. “All the responsibility has been loaded on to me with no respect for the truth,” he said.

Victims of the disaster celebrated the verdict, a lawyer representing them said. “All of our clients suffered a horrendous ordeal which some may never truly overcome. The trauma they have been through has left some of them needing specialist therapy and counselling to come to terms with what happened and enable them to begin to move on with their lives,” Philip Banks, a personal injury lawyer at Irwin Mitchell, said in a statement.

The Costa Concordia , which was owned by the Carnival Corporation, was abandoned for more than two years in the Mediterranean. Its removal to Genoa, where it is now being scrapped, was the most expensive maritime salvage operation in history.

While Schettino repeatedly suggested that he was unfairly singled out for blame in a disaster where many elements, including faulty equipment, played a role, prosectors strenuously objected, saying he alone bore the responsibility for the fatalities that night.

On the charge of manslaughter – the most serious one against him – the case turned not on the accident itself, but on Schettino’s decision to delay the order of evacuation for more than an hour.

Lawyers for the state said every passenger and crew member on board could have survived if Schettino had immediately ordered an evacuation. Instead, over months of testimony, the court heard how the captain initially told passengers and officials on land that the ship, which went dark after the crash, had a power outage and was not in peril.

The youngest victim of the tragedy was a five-year-old girl, who drowned with her father after falling through a hole in the boat. The pair had been turned away from one lifeboat for lack of space and were heading to the other side of the ship to try to embark on another.

The ship ran aground just 15 minutes after Schettino ordered a risky pass by the Tuscan island of Giglio. The captain denied he made the order to impress his lover at the time, a Moldovan dancer who was with him on the ship’s bridge and who was forced to admit in court that she had been having an affair with him.

It was Schettino’s decision to abandon his post before all the passengers were evacuated and seek safety on board a lifeboat that most enraged Italians after the disaster. While Schettino insisted in court that he had slipped and fallen into the safety of the lifeboat, that claim was thoroughly discredited by prosecutors.

Schettino suggested some good had come out of the disaster, pointing out that cruise liners now faced tougher regulations and gave more training to officers.The verdict was announced in the local Grosseto theatre, a venue that was used instead of a normal court room in order to accommodate the throngs of journalists covering the trial. The judges in the case deliberated in the theatre’s dressing rooms.

• Costa Concordia
• Francesco Schettino

More on this story

Costa Concordia: Italian tragedy that reflected state of a nation

Captain Schettino and the sinking of the Costa Concordia - video report

Costa Concordia workers find body of last person missing in wreckage

Eyewitness: Giglio, Italy

Survivors, salvage workers and locals: the lives changed by Costa Concordia

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Pictures: 5 Cruise Ship Disasters That Changed Travel

Some good may yet come of Italy's Costa Concordia wreck. At least since Titanic, cruise accidents have sparked new safety standards.

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Watch CBS News

Cruise ship runs aground off Italy, 3 dead

January 14, 2012 / 8:16 PM EST / CBS/AP

Last Updated 8:07 p.m. ET

PORTO SANTO STEFANO, Italy — Divers searched the submerged part of a luxury cruise liner that went aground off Italy's coast in case any of about 40 people unaccounted for might be trapped inside, a coast guard official said Saturday.

Three bodies were recovered from the sea after the luxury cruise Costa Concordia ran aground and tipped over off the tiny island of Giglio near the coast of Tuscany late Friday. Rescuers searching the wrecked ship for the missing found two survivors late Saturday in a cabin on the ship. They were in good condition, rescuers told the ANSA Italian news agency.

On Saturday the ship was lying virtually flat off Giglio's coast, its starboard side submerged in the water and a 160-foot gash showing clearly on its upturned hull.

A coast guard official said those unaccounted for might be "in the belly of the ship."

Capt. Cosimo Nicastro of the Coast Guard said Saturday divers are helping carry out a risky operation to inspect the submerged half of the Costa Concordia in case anyone remained trapped inside.

Italian media is reporting that the captain of the ship has been detained by police and is being held in a "stato di fermo" - detained for questioning - with prosecutors having 48 hours to arrest him or let him go. Corriere della Sera is reporting that the first officer has been detained as well.

Passengers described a scene reminiscent of "Titanic," saying they escaped the ship by crawling along upended hallways, desperately trying to reach safety as the lights went out and plates and glasses crashed. Helicopters whisked some survivors to safety, others were rescued by private boats in the area, and witnesses said some people jumped from the ship into the dark, cold sea.

Fact sheet: The Costa Concordia cruise liner

Nicastro told Sky TG24 TV there are no firm indications that anyone was trapped. But he notes rescuers carried out an extensive search of the waters near the ship for hours and "we would have seen bodies."

ANSA quoted the prefect's office in the province of Grosseto as saying that authorities have accounted for 4,165 of the 4,234 people who had boarded the liner.

One of the victims was a Peruvian crew member, a diplomat from the South American country said, adding that a Peruvian woman was also missing. The ANSA new agency identified the other two fatalities as French passengers, but didn't cite a source.

At least one of the dead is believed to have succumbed to a heart attack when he panicked and jumped into icy waters, reports CBS News correspondent Alan Pizzey.

Pizzey reports that some passengers were complaining that, as they came off the ship, no one was actually counting them. With more than 3,000 passengers and more than 1,000 crew members, there are a lot of people to account for among those rescued by lifeboats, ships and helicopters.

Passengers complained the crew failed to give instructions on how to evacuate and once the emergency became clear, delayed lowering the lifeboats until the ship was listing too heavily for many of them to be released.

Carnival Corp., which owns the cruise line that the ship belongs to, didn't address the allegations in a statement it issued.

"Our hearts go out to everyone affected by the grounding of the Costa Concordia and especially the loved ones of those who lost their lives. They will remain in our thoughts and prayers in the wake of this tragic event."

Authorities have been checking names against the passenger list, but have had a hard time accounting for everyone. They still hadn't counted all the survivors by the time they reached the mainland 12 hours later.

An evacuation drill was scheduled for Saturday afternoon, even though some passengers had already been on board for several days.

"It was so unorganized, our evacuation drill was scheduled for 5 p.m.," said Melissa Goduti, 28, of Wallingford, Connecticut, who had set out on the cruise of the Mediterranean hours earlier. "We had joked 'What if something had happened today?'"

"Have you seen 'Titanic'? That's exactly what it was," said Valerie Ananias, 31, a schoolteacher from Los Angeles who was traveling with her sister and parents on the first of two cruises around the Mediterranean. They all bore dark red bruises on their knees from the desperate crawl they endured along nearly vertical hallways and stairwells, trying to reach rescue boats.

"We were crawling up a hallway, in the dark, with only the light from the life vest strobe flashing," her mother, Georgia Ananias, 61, said. "We could hear plates and dishes crashing, people slamming against walls."

She choked up as she recounted the moment when an Argentine couple handed her their 3-year-old daughter, unable to keep their balance as the ship lurched to the side and the family found themselves standing on a wall. "He said 'take my baby,"' Mrs. Ananias said, covering her mouth with her hand as she teared up. "I grabbed the baby. But then I was being pushed down. I didn't want the baby to fall down the stairs. I gave the baby back. I couldn't hold her.

"I thought that was the end and I thought they should be with their baby," she said.

"I wonder where they are," daughter Valerie whispered.

The family said they were some of the last off the ship, forced to shimmy along a rope down the exposed side of the ship to a waiting rescue vessel below.

Survivor Christine Hammer, from Bonn, Germany, shivered near the harbor of Porto Santo Stefano, on the mainland, after stepping off a ferry from Giglio. She was wearing elegant dinner clothes — a gray cashmere sweater, a silk scarf — along with a large pair of hiking boots, which a kind islander gave her after she lost her shoes in the scramble to escape. Left behind in her cabin were her passport, credit cards and phone.

Hammer, 65, told The Associated Press she was eating her first course, an appetizer of cuttlefish, sauteed mushrooms and salad, on her first night aboard her first-ever cruise, which was a gift to her and her husband, Gert, from her local church where she volunteers.

Suddenly, "We heard a crash. Glasses and plates fell down and we went out of the dining room and we were told it wasn't anything dangerous," she said.

Several passengers concurred, saying crew members for a good 45 minutes told passengers there was a simple "technical problem" that had caused the lights to go off. Seasoned cruisers, however, knew better and went to get their life jackets from their cabins and report to their "muster stations," the emergency stations each passenger is assigned to, they said.

Once there, though, crew members delayed lowering the lifeboats even thought the ship was listing badly, they said.

"We had to scream at the controllers to release the boats from the side," said Mike van Dijk, a 54-year-old from Pretoria, South Africa. "We were standing in the corridors and they weren't allowing us to get onto the boats. It was a scramble, an absolute scramble."

Passengers Alan and Laurie Willits from Wingham, Ontario, celebrating their 30th wedding anniversary, said they were watching the magic show in the ship's main theater when they felt an initial lurch, as if from a severe steering maneuver, followed a few seconds later by a "shudder" that tipped trash cans over. The subsequent listing of the ship made the theater curtains seem like they were standing on their side.

"And then the magician disappeared," Laurie Willits said, adding that the panicked audience members fled for their cabins as well.

Once at their life boat station, crew members directed passengers to go upstairs from the fourth floor deck; Alan Willits said he refused.

"I said, 'No, this isn't right.' And I came out and I argued 'When you get this boat stabilized, I'll go up to the fifth floor then," he said. Eventually, his lifeboat was lowered down.

But things didn't improve for passengers once aboard the lifeboats or on land.

"No one counted us, neither in the life boats nor on land," said Ophelie Gondelle, 28, a French military officer from Marseille. She said there had been no evacuation drill since she boarded in Marseille, France on Jan. 8.

A top Costa executive, Gianni Onorato, said Saturday the Concordia's captain had the liner on its regular, weekly route when it struck a reef.

"The ship was doing what it does 52 times a year, going along the route between Civitavecchia and Savona," a shaken-looking Onorato, who is Costa's director general, told reporters on Giglio, a popular vacation isle about 18 miles off Italy's central west coast. The captain is an 11-year Costa veteran, he said.

He said Costa was cooperating with Italian investigators to find out what went wrong.

Costa Cruises said about 1,000 Italian passengers were onboard, as well as more than 500 Germans, about 160 French and about 1,000 crew members.

Some 30 people were reported injured, most of them suffering only bruises, but at least two people were reported to be in grave condition. Several passengers came off the ferries on stretchers, but it appeared more out of exhaustion and shock than serious injury.

The evacuees were taking refuge in schools, hotels, and a church on Giglio. Those evacuated by helicopter were taken to the port of Porto Santo Stefano on the nearby mainland.

Passengers sat dazed in a middle school opened for them, wrapped in wool or aluminum blankets, with some wearing their life preservers and their shoeless feet covered with aluminum foil. Civil protection crews served them warm tea and bread, but confusion reigned supreme as passengers tried desperately to find the right bus to begin their journey home.

Tanja Berto, from Ebenfurth, Austria, was shuttled from one line to another with her mother and 2-year-old son Bruno, trying to figure out how to get back to Savona, where they began their cruise a week ago.

"It's his birthday today," she said of her son, rolling her eyes as she held Bruno and tended to her mother, who had grown faint and was lying on the ground. "Happy birthday, Bruno."

Survivors far outnumbered Giglio's 1,500 residents, and island Mayor Sergio Ortelli issued an appeal for islanders — "anyone with a roof" — to open their homes to shelter the evacuees.

Coast Guard Cmdr. Francesco Paolillo said the exact circumstances of the accident were still unclear, but that the first alarm went off about 10:30 p.m., about three hours after the Concordia had begun its voyage from the port of Civitavecchia, en route to its first port of call, Savona, in northwestern Italy.

The coast guard official, speaking from the port captain's office in the Tuscan port of Livorno, said the vessel "hit an obstacle."

The cruise liner's captain, Paolillo said, then tried to steer his ship toward shallow waters, near Giglio's small port, to make evacuation by lifeboat easier. But after the ship started listing badly, lifeboat evacuation was no longer feasible, Paolillo said.

Five helicopters, from the coast guard, navy and air force, took turns airlifting survivors and ferrying them to safely. A coast guard member was airlifted aboard the vessel to help people get aboard a small basket so they could be hoisted up to the helicopter, said Capt. Cosimo Nicastro, another Coast Guard official.

Costa Cruises said the Costa Concordia was sailing on a cruise across the Mediterranean Sea, starting from Civitavecchia with scheduled calls to Savona, Marseille, Barcelona, Palma de Mallorca, Cagliari and Palermo.

The Concordia had a previous accident in Italian waters, ANSA reported. In 2008, when strong winds buffeted Palermo, the cruise ship banged against the Sicilian port's dock, and sustained damage but no one was injured, ANSA said.

More from CBS News

Florence in California: Carnival launches new Italian-style cruise ship

Carnival Cruise Line is bringing a touch of Italy to Southern California.

The line launched Carnival Firenze, inspired by its namesake city, this week. The vessel sailed its maiden voyage from its Long Beach homeport on Thursday.

“We carry more guests than any other cruise line from California, and now this ship is giving us the opportunity to offer more fun to more people sailing from Long Beach,” Christine Duffy, the line’s president, said in a news release . “The recipe combining this ship’s beautiful Italian theming with the familiarity of our friendly team’s hospitality is, in a word, perfecto!”

The ship is the second in the Carnival Fun Italian Style concept after sister ship Carnival Venezia joined the fleet last summer. Both were originally part of Costa Cruises – also owned by parent company Carnival Corp. – before being rehomed.

Where will Carnival Firenze sail?

The roughly 5,000-guest ship will offer Baja Mexico and Mexican Riviera cruises ranging from three to seven days. Stops include destinations like Cabo San Lucas, Puerto Vallarta and Catalina Island.

What can guests expect on board?

Built in 2020, Firenze was refurbished earlier this year to add Carnival-specific touches. Those include staple venues like the Fahrenheit 555 steakhouse and JavaBlue Cafe.

But the line leans into the ship’s Italian motif. The ship’s atrium was designed with Florence’s Piazza del Duomo in mind and the Lido deck takes influence from the Italian Riviera. There’s even a replica of Michelangelo’s David on board that was previously on Carnival Pride (the real sculpture is located in Florence’s Accademia Gallery).

The theme extends to the food and drink options, with eateries like Italian specialty restaurant Il Viaggio, Mexican-Italian fusion venue Tomodoro and La Strada Grill, serving Italian street food. Frizzante specializes in bubbly drinks, and passengers can sip craft cocktails and Italian coffee at Amari.

Other features include the WaterWorks water park and Serenity Adult-Only Retreat.

How long should I take a cruise?: Here's how short and long cruises compare

How much does Carnival Firenze cost?

Prices vary based on sailing date and other factors, but a five-day Mexican Riviera cruise departing on May 30 currently starts at $409 per person based on double occupancy, according to Carnival’s website . The fare includes much of the food on the ship, drinks like regular coffee and iced tea and more.

Nathan Diller is a consumer travel reporter for USA TODAY based in Nashville. You can reach him at [email protected].