Giglio Island, Italy - Salvage crews finished raising the wrecked Costa Concordia cruise liner on Tuesday, officials said after a 19-hour operation on the Italian island of Giglio ended in the early hours of Tuesday morning.
One of the most complex and expensive maritime salvage operations ever attempted saw the 114 500-ton ship pulled upright by a series of huge jacks and cables and set on an artificial platform drilled into the rocky sea bed.
“The ship has been settled on to its platforms,” said Franco Gabrielli, the head of Italy's Civil Protection Authority.
The Concordia has lain half-submerged on its side just off the Italian island of Giglio since it ran aground and sank with the loss of 32 lives on January 13, 2012.
The Concordia was carrying more than 4 000 people when it hit rocks off Giglio and capsized. Two bodies have yet to be recovered and underwater cameras failed to find any sign of them as darkness fell on Monday evening.
“They must still be under the keel of the Concordia and I hope after this finally they will have a grave (their families)can cry over,” said Luciano Castro, a 49-year-old journalist who was on the ship when it sank.
In contrast to the accident, a catalogue of mishap and misjudgement over which the Concordia's captain Francesco Schettino faces multiple charges, the salvage operation has been a tightly co-ordinated engineering feat.
At a cost estimated at more than 600-million euros, it is expected to be the most expensive maritime wreck recovery ever. - Reuters