Owner of Costa Concordia pledges assistance to passengers


Updated at 5:30 p.m. ET: The children of a Minnesota couple missing since last week's Costa Concordia disaster in Italy said Wednesday their parents are not among those passengers whose bodies were recently recovered.
Family members posted the information on their blog, and said they were praying that conditions at the stricken cruise ship would improve so authorities could resume search operations.
Jerry and Barbara Heil, of White Bear Lake, Minn., are the only Americans still unaccounted for. The Heils were among the passengers still listed as missing, according to an official tally released Wednesday by Italian authorities.
Family members, who had been waiting to hear the identities of five bodies recovered Tuesday, said on the blog that they received confirmation that their parents were not among them.
Italian rescue workers suspended operations early Wednesday after the ship shifted slightly on the rocks, creating concerns about the safety of divers and firefighters searching for the missing.
"We continue to pray and hope for advantageous conditions which will allow the search and rescue operations to continue," the Heil family said on the blog. "While it is certainly hard for us to see the recovery efforts stall due to the unstable conditions present at and around the Costa Concordia, we are also very concerned for the safety of the Italian Coast Guard as they continue to put forth a heroic effort in trying to find those who remain missing.
"We are grateful to all of those who are working so hard to find our parents," the statement said.
Costa Concordia captain Francesco Schettino has reportedly now told officials that he tripped and fell into a lifeboat shortly after the ship began taking on water near Giglio Island.
Updated at 3:30 p.m. ET: Francesco Schettino, captain of the doomed Costa Concordia that partially sunk on Friday, said he did not abandon ship, according to a transcript published by Italy's Corriere della Sera newspaper and reported by the Associated Press.
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"I did not abandon a ship with 100 people on board ... the ship suddenly listed and we were thrown into the water," Schettino reportedly said during a recorded telephone conversation with Capt. Gregorio De Falco of the Italian coast guard in Livorno.
The transcript also showed the coast guard official urgently commanding the captain to return to the cruise ship after he had abandoned it.
"You go on board! Is that clear? Do you hear me?" the Coast Guard officer shouted as Schettino sat safe in a life raft and frantic passengers struggled to escape the listing ship. "It is an order. Don't make any more excuses. You have declared 'Abandon ship.' Now I am in charge."
The officer confronted him with an expletive-laced order to get back on board, which has quickly entered the Italian lexicon. The four-word phrase has become a Twitter hashtag and Italian media have shown photos of T-shirts bearing the command.
Criminal charges including manslaughter and abandoning ship are expected to be filed by prosecutors shortly. Schettino faces a possible 12 years in prison on the abandoning ship charge alone.

http://overheadbin.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/01/18/10179794-owner-of-costa-concordia-pledges-assistance-to-passengers

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