Court rules Costa Concordia captain unfit to run ship

Laura Lezza / Getty Images

The Costa Condordia remains stricken after a further five bodies were found by a mechanical robot, two months after it ran aground on March 23, 2012 in Giglio Porto, Italy.

By Reuters

Italy's top appeals court ruled on Wednesday that Francesco Schettino, the captain of the Costa Concordia, was unfit to command the cruise liner which ran aground and capsized off the Tuscan island of Giglio in January, causing at least 30 deaths.

In a written explanation of its decision to maintain a house arrest order against Schettino, the Court of Cassation said he had shown "little resilience in performing command functions or in handling responsibility for the safety of persons under his care."

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Schettino has been accused of wrecking the 126,215-ton liner by bringing it too close to shore, where a rocky ledge tore a gash in its side and made it keel over and sink. According to the court, he "has proven not to be able to handle a dangerous situation typical of his profession, despite the specific professional skills and experience."

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Investigators also accuse Schettino of delaying evacuation and losing control of the operation, during which he abandoned ship before all 4,200 passengers and crew had been taken off the vessel.

He has been charged with multiple manslaughter, causing the accident and abandoning ship prematurely. A pre-trial hearing was held in Grosseto, near Florence, in March.

The Court of Cassation said Schettino had shown himself unable to manage a crisis and to ensure the safety of his passengers and crew and said there would be a risk of a repeat of the disaster if he were given a command again.

That part of the ruling justified the decision to keep Schettino under house arrest at his home in Meta di Sorrento, near Naples in southern Italy, as a concrete danger of a recurrence must be shown for the arrest order to be upheld.

Thirty bodies were recovered and two are missing. The wreck lies on its side in some 20 meters of water within a stone's throw of the picturesque island port.

Salvage experts are expected to stabilize the wreck by August and then refloat it and remove it from the marine natural park off the Tuscan coast where it sank.

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