Posted on 12/29/2014 2:13:41 PM PST by moose07
The death toll following a fire on the Norman Atlantic ferry off Corfu has risen to 10, with the evacuation of all those on board now complete.
One man was killed when trying to escape the ship, and a further nine bodies have since been found.
More than 400 people were rescued amid gale-force winds and thick smoke.
It is not clear if others are still missing. The Italian authorities said they could not verify the actual number of people originally on board.
Rescuers are still searching the vessel.
The ferry company operating the journey from the Greek city of Patras to Ancona in Italy said a total of 478 people had been on the ship when it left.
Italian Transport Minister Maurizio Lupi said that only 427 had been accounted for so far, but added that it was the responsibility of the port of departure to verify actual passenger numbers.
"That is why we are continuing our [search] effort: we cannot know what the exact number was," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.co.uk ...
Horrible story. The message is...never set foot on an Italian ship.
The ferry had been overloaded with oil tankers(!), which exploded. The fire doors had not been closed and didn’t close automatically, there was no alarm given to the passengers (those who woke up with the heat and smell of burning plastic woke up the others on their deck), and the small (only 4 persons, I think) crew was nowhere to be found. The lifeboats ceased dropping because of a malfunction, but most of them were on the deck with the fire, so they were unreachable anyway.
Between the efforts of the Italian and Greek military and the merchant marine (8 huge freighters blocked the wind), most people were saved. So the aforementioned get big credit, but I think Italy has got to take a close look at its passenger carriers. Of course, they’re probably all bosom buddies with whatever power is in charge of the government now, so this will probably go away.
How horrible. May the victims who died rest in peace.
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