#CostaConcordia - There were celebrations all round on the Tuscan island of Giglio early yesterday as the operation to raise the capsized cruise liner Costa Concordia was successful in lifting the ship upright, The Irish Times reports.
The video above captures in time lapse the dangerous and difficult 'parbuckling' operation that involved tying a sling of cables around the hull of the vessel in order to lift her bit by bit from the shallows off the Italian coast.
“This is the first visible sign of a job well done," said Franco Gabrielli, head of the authority co-ordinating the salvage operation. "We’ve taken a decisive step towards the moment when the ship can be towed away from the island.”
The Irish Times also quoted Titan Salvage MD Captain Rich Habib, who said: “This was a perfect job, it don’t get better than this...and sure, this will be part of shipping history because this was one of the most difficult salvage jobs of recent times...”
The next step in the salvage of the ill-fated Costa Concordia is to repair some of the severe damage to the side of the ship that has spent more than 18 months submerged, in order to get her seaworthy enough for transport to the port town of Piombino where she will be scrapped.
