catlover79
01-24-2012, 12:39 AM
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2090573/Costa-Concordia-survivors-offered-30-discount-cruise-amid-100m-lawsuit-threat.html#socialLinks
Adding insult to injury: Survivors of Costa Concordia tragedy offered 30% discount on their NEXT cruise amid £100m lawsuit threat
By Julian Gavaghan
Last updated at 5:23 PM on 23rd January 2012
Costa Cruises called victims and asked if they were having nightmares
Firm faces having to pay hundreds of million of pounds in compensation
Class action lawsuit to be filed by 100 victims - with more expected to join
Number of missing passengers may be higher as 'some were unregistered'
Survivors of the Costa Concordia tragedy have been offered an 'insulting' 30 per cent discount on their next cruise amid claims the operator is trying to stave off an expensive lawsuit.
Victims of the Italian disaster, which has so far claimed 13 lives with at least 19 passengers still missing, have received phone calls from Costa staff offering the deal alongside refunds.
They were also understood to have been asked if they were suffering nightmares, sleepless nights and needed counselling.
It is believed that the firm is trying to reduce the damage from an impending lawsuit, which could cost it more than £100million in compensation.
So far, 100 passengers have joined a class action suit to be filed against owners Carnival Cruises in Miami, Florida. Each is said to be demanding between £100,000 and £1million.
But other victims may yet take legal action - with the offer of a discount prompting even more anger among those on board the Concordia, which capsized off the island of Griglio ten days ago.
Brian Page, 63, a retired accountant from Southampton, who survived by sliding from one side of the deck to another to find a lifeboat, told The Telegraph: 'It is a ridiculous and insulting offer.
'I'm very disappointed in them.They are not accepting their responsibilities at all. Our only back-up is separate legal action.'
A spokesman for Costa Conciere Cruises told the newspaper: 'The company is trying to do everything they can for those passengers directly affected. 'The company is not only going to refund everybody but they will offer a 30 per cent discount on future cruises if they want to stay loyal to the company.'
So far 13 bodies have been pulled from the wreckage. But there are fears that the number of passengers still missing could be higher than first thought. It has emerged that latest body to be pulled from the wreckage - a woman who is thought to be Hungarian - could be an unregistered passenger.
Italian investigators said other unregistered passengers might have been aboard the ship after drivers yesterday retrieved the corpse.
She was wearing a life jacket and found in the rear of a submerged portion of the vessel which hit rocks and capsized off the island of Griglio ten days ago.
Officials are today considering whether to start pumping some half a million gallons of fuel from the ship to avoid an environmental catastrophe.
There are fears that the Concordia's double-bottom fuel tanks could rupture in case of sudden shifting, spilling 2,200 tonnes of heavy fuel into pristine sea around Giglio.
The island is part of an archipelago in some of the Mediterranean's clearest waters and a prized fishing area.
The search had been halted for several hours yesterday, after instrument readings indicated that the Concordia had shifted on its precarious perch on a seabed just outside Giglio's port.
A few yards away, the sea bottom drops off suddenly, by some 65-100 feet, and if the Concordia should abruptly roll off its ledge, rescuers could be trapped inside.
When instrument data indicated the vessel had stabilised again, rescuers returned, but explored only the above-water section and evacuation staging areas where survivors indicated that people who did not make it into lifeboats during the chaotic evacuation could have remained.
Authorities are also trying to identify five corpses which are badly decomposed after spending a long time in the water.
Mr Gabrielli said the other eight bodies: four French, an Italian, a Hungarian, a German and a Spanish national, had been identified.
The missing include French passengers, an elderly American couple, a Peruvian crew member and an Indian crewman and an Italian father and his five-year-old daughter.
Some of their relatives toured the wreckage yesterday and also met Pierluigi Foschi chief executive of Costa Crociere, the ship's operator, who viewed the crippled cruise liner from a boat.
France's ambassador to Italy, Alain Le Roy, recounting Mr Foschi's visit, said: "He came to see the families, all families. He met the French family. He met the American family.
“I am sure he is meeting other families, mostly to express his compassion ... to say that Costa will do everything possible to find the people, to compensate families in any way.’
Passengers were dining at a gala supper when the Concordia sailed close to Giglio and struck the reef, which is indicated on maritime and even tourist maps.
The liner's Italian captain, Francesco Schettino, is under house arrest as prosecutors investigate him for suspected manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning the ship while many were still aboard.
Costa Crociere, a subsidiary of US-based Carnival Cruise Lines, has said Schettino had deviated without permission from the vessel's route in an apparent manoeuvre to sail close to the island and impress passengers.
Schettino, despite audiotapes of his defying coastguard orders to scramble back aboard, has denied he abandoned ship while hundreds of passengers were desperately trying to get off the capsizing vessel.
The 52-year-old has said he co-ordinated the rescue from aboard a lifeboat and then from the shore.
He claims he sailed his ship too close to the coast because he was asked to do so by his bosses.
Francesco Schettino said the ‘sail by salute’ was ‘arranged and wanted’ by Costa Cruises chiefs for publicity reasons, according to details of his police questioning leaked to the Italian media.
A spokesman for Costa Conciere told Mail Online: 'Passengers on board the Costa Concordia on the night of the accident have not been offered a discount on future cruises.'
The firm was asked to explain the discrepancy between this comment and the one it gave The Telegraph that confirmed the discount, as well as passenger accounts. It has yet to respond.
Adding insult to injury: Survivors of Costa Concordia tragedy offered 30% discount on their NEXT cruise amid £100m lawsuit threat
By Julian Gavaghan
Last updated at 5:23 PM on 23rd January 2012
Costa Cruises called victims and asked if they were having nightmares
Firm faces having to pay hundreds of million of pounds in compensation
Class action lawsuit to be filed by 100 victims - with more expected to join
Number of missing passengers may be higher as 'some were unregistered'
Survivors of the Costa Concordia tragedy have been offered an 'insulting' 30 per cent discount on their next cruise amid claims the operator is trying to stave off an expensive lawsuit.
Victims of the Italian disaster, which has so far claimed 13 lives with at least 19 passengers still missing, have received phone calls from Costa staff offering the deal alongside refunds.
They were also understood to have been asked if they were suffering nightmares, sleepless nights and needed counselling.
It is believed that the firm is trying to reduce the damage from an impending lawsuit, which could cost it more than £100million in compensation.
So far, 100 passengers have joined a class action suit to be filed against owners Carnival Cruises in Miami, Florida. Each is said to be demanding between £100,000 and £1million.
But other victims may yet take legal action - with the offer of a discount prompting even more anger among those on board the Concordia, which capsized off the island of Griglio ten days ago.
Brian Page, 63, a retired accountant from Southampton, who survived by sliding from one side of the deck to another to find a lifeboat, told The Telegraph: 'It is a ridiculous and insulting offer.
'I'm very disappointed in them.They are not accepting their responsibilities at all. Our only back-up is separate legal action.'
A spokesman for Costa Conciere Cruises told the newspaper: 'The company is trying to do everything they can for those passengers directly affected. 'The company is not only going to refund everybody but they will offer a 30 per cent discount on future cruises if they want to stay loyal to the company.'
So far 13 bodies have been pulled from the wreckage. But there are fears that the number of passengers still missing could be higher than first thought. It has emerged that latest body to be pulled from the wreckage - a woman who is thought to be Hungarian - could be an unregistered passenger.
Italian investigators said other unregistered passengers might have been aboard the ship after drivers yesterday retrieved the corpse.
She was wearing a life jacket and found in the rear of a submerged portion of the vessel which hit rocks and capsized off the island of Griglio ten days ago.
Officials are today considering whether to start pumping some half a million gallons of fuel from the ship to avoid an environmental catastrophe.
There are fears that the Concordia's double-bottom fuel tanks could rupture in case of sudden shifting, spilling 2,200 tonnes of heavy fuel into pristine sea around Giglio.
The island is part of an archipelago in some of the Mediterranean's clearest waters and a prized fishing area.
The search had been halted for several hours yesterday, after instrument readings indicated that the Concordia had shifted on its precarious perch on a seabed just outside Giglio's port.
A few yards away, the sea bottom drops off suddenly, by some 65-100 feet, and if the Concordia should abruptly roll off its ledge, rescuers could be trapped inside.
When instrument data indicated the vessel had stabilised again, rescuers returned, but explored only the above-water section and evacuation staging areas where survivors indicated that people who did not make it into lifeboats during the chaotic evacuation could have remained.
Authorities are also trying to identify five corpses which are badly decomposed after spending a long time in the water.
Mr Gabrielli said the other eight bodies: four French, an Italian, a Hungarian, a German and a Spanish national, had been identified.
The missing include French passengers, an elderly American couple, a Peruvian crew member and an Indian crewman and an Italian father and his five-year-old daughter.
Some of their relatives toured the wreckage yesterday and also met Pierluigi Foschi chief executive of Costa Crociere, the ship's operator, who viewed the crippled cruise liner from a boat.
France's ambassador to Italy, Alain Le Roy, recounting Mr Foschi's visit, said: "He came to see the families, all families. He met the French family. He met the American family.
“I am sure he is meeting other families, mostly to express his compassion ... to say that Costa will do everything possible to find the people, to compensate families in any way.’
Passengers were dining at a gala supper when the Concordia sailed close to Giglio and struck the reef, which is indicated on maritime and even tourist maps.
The liner's Italian captain, Francesco Schettino, is under house arrest as prosecutors investigate him for suspected manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning the ship while many were still aboard.
Costa Crociere, a subsidiary of US-based Carnival Cruise Lines, has said Schettino had deviated without permission from the vessel's route in an apparent manoeuvre to sail close to the island and impress passengers.
Schettino, despite audiotapes of his defying coastguard orders to scramble back aboard, has denied he abandoned ship while hundreds of passengers were desperately trying to get off the capsizing vessel.
The 52-year-old has said he co-ordinated the rescue from aboard a lifeboat and then from the shore.
He claims he sailed his ship too close to the coast because he was asked to do so by his bosses.
Francesco Schettino said the ‘sail by salute’ was ‘arranged and wanted’ by Costa Cruises chiefs for publicity reasons, according to details of his police questioning leaked to the Italian media.
A spokesman for Costa Conciere told Mail Online: 'Passengers on board the Costa Concordia on the night of the accident have not been offered a discount on future cruises.'
The firm was asked to explain the discrepancy between this comment and the one it gave The Telegraph that confirmed the discount, as well as passenger accounts. It has yet to respond.