The hole is in a highly suspect area, typically used for fuel tanks, or sometimes Ballast. If it is in a ballast tank it won't do a lot of harm as far as things getting out.
If you can imagine a space usually no more than about 1.5m deep, above the bottom of the outer hull and also tanks of a similar width along the sides of the ship along the greater part of it's length short of the curved bow and stern setions and maybe 6m high, that is roughly where you will find most tanks, either Ballast, Fresh Water and Fuel.
These are some old drawings I did when we salvaged an old Singaporean vessel that had almost no drawings, I'm afraid that they don't reproduce very well from AutoCad to Windows Paint, but it will give you an idea,... even though this is a cargo vessel and the ship in question is a passo, the hull doesn't change a lot, just how it's fitted out inside:wink:. One's full of rubbish the other has valuable scrap iron and timber an' stuff.
Dark Blue is Ballast, Brown Heavy Fuel oil, Gold is Diesel and light blue is Fresh water. There are a squillion other small tanks for daily service etc, but they are of little concern.
I appreciate the information for it better helps me understand the basic layout of a sea going vessel when looking at this situation, I can better understand now why authorities are so concerned, aparently the Concorida is run aground to a major nearby marine sanctuary and concerns also are now drifting to the large amounts of cleaning chemicals spread through out the ship.
I cannont find any information, and although the rescue stage seems to be drawing to a close, and that I completely understand why emphasis was placed on finding trapped survivors, I am not sure if water samples from inside the vessel have been taken to check for a variety of loose chemicals.
Hopefully most are the newer envorimentally freindly cleaners and sanitizers, as well as kitchen chemicals that will dillute easily in the sea water, and disipate harmlessly as designed.
Costa Cruises announced a few years ago that it would strive to become the world's Greenest Cruise lines and in the process won the Green Star Notation, so it would make sense if part of that effort meant switching to more enviromental chemicals and solutions.
They don't clean for anything but they are less impactful in a situation like this.
Also , one last question, I have heard that more modern cruise vessels tend to be top heavy, is this true? Or are the remarkably stable?
And would the 50 m gash comprimise multiple compartments thus the balance of the ship as those compartments flooded? If not then was running the ship aground the best option. For they say the space between the bottom of the Concorida and the sea bed at the point of impact was about 15m, I do not know if this was accurate however.
Although I do not think I would have abandoned the evacuation effort until the last possible moments, I will admit, given If I was in the captian's situation after the impact I don't think I would have made any better of command decision.
So unlike countless conversations I have found on the topic, I can't say I will sit back from a holier than thou standpoint and commend everything he did. I am not a sea captian, and honestly have no clue how to proceed in minimizing the damage and loss of life of a massive sea going vessel under emergancy circumstances, So I cannot really comment on how he proceeded after impact up to the evacuation process.
Although I do agree he should have stayed onboard until the last moment and all passengers were evacuated.
