Concordia search is abandoned

Divers have finally abandoned their search for remaining bodies in the flooded section of cruise ship Costa Concordia, which capsized off the coast of Italy on January 13. The Civil Protection agency said it was too dangerous to continue.
Relatives and diplomatic officials representing the countries of the 15 passengers and crew still listed as missing have been informed of the decision.
The agency says emergency crews continue to inspect the part of the ship that still above the water line and will use specialist equipment to check whether there are any bodies on the sea bed.
Meanwhile, Costa Corporation, parent company of Costa Cruises, has disclosed that bookings among its 11 brands are “considerably down” on a year ago, although the decline “bottomed out” on Monday, January 16, three days after the accident.
In a report to the stock exchange, Carnival says it does not expect the reduction in bookings to be long-lasting, although it is predicting that the Concordia effect will cost the company between £99 million and £111 million in the current financial year.
Elsewhere, a perfect storm of incidents threatens to engulf the cruise industry. The death of a 26-year-old man, in a fall from an upper level of the six-deck atrium on Carnival Fantasy, is being investigated by police in the Bahamas.
Two days later, a 47-year-old woman died on Royal Caribbean’s Liberty of the Seas after falling down a flight of stairs as she was leaving the ship’s Catacombs nightclub during a four-night cruise from Florida to Mexico.
On the US Virgin island of St Thomas, 13 passengers on a shore excursion from Royal Caribbean’s Serenade of the Seas were injured when their open-sided taxi crashed. All were able to return to the ship after treatment, apart from a woman who suffered a fractured hip.