Three people were killed and 4,200 passengers and crew were rescued last night after a packed cruise liner began capsizing off the Italian coast after running aground.
Twenty-four British holidaymakers were on the Costa Concordia which had left port at 7pm for a seven-day Mediterranean Cruise - but within two hours, it ran aground in the sea with a major electrical fault.
The 13 deck liner then began to take on water after hitting rocks creating a 160ft gash in the hull, near the island of Giglio, off the Tuscan coast.
Passengers said the ship had begun to sink so much it was difficult to launch lifeboats, while some said they saw holiday-makers leaping into the water to swim to safety.
The Foreign Office said it was not aware of any injuries or fatalities to Britons.
Among the dead was a man around age 65, who officials believe may not have been able to withstand the cold of the sea at night.
It is thought that the death toll may still rise and there are reports some people are still not accounted for.
Terrified passengers were ordered to put on life vests and man life boats as the 850ft-long luxury 'floating palace', which costs up to £1,200 a night, began to list heavily to one side by about 20 degrees.
Helicopters plucked to safety some 50 people who were trapped on the liner.
By this morning, the ship was lying virtually flat off the coast, its starboard side submerged in the water.
We were having dinner aboard when we heard a loud noise, like that of the keel being dragged over something,' passenger Luciano Castro told Italian state radio.
The lights went out 'and there were scenes of panic, glasses falling to the floor,' he said.
Another passenger Mara Parmegiani said 'it was like a scene from the Titanic.'
Passengers complained the crew failed to give instructions on how to evacuate and once the emergency became clear, delayed lowering the lifeboats until the ship was listing too heavily for many of them to be released.
The evacuation drill was only scheduled for Saturday afternoon, even though some passengers had already been on board for several days.
Melissa Goduti, 28, of Wallingford, Connecticut, said: 'It was so unorganized, our evacuation drill was scheduled for 5pm. We had joked what if something had happened today.'
'Have you seen 'Titanic?' That's exactly what it was,' said Valerie Ananias, 31, a schoolteacher from Los Angeles who was traveling with her sister and parents on the first of two cruises around the Mediterranean.
They all bore dark red bruises on their knees from the desperate crawl they endured along hallways and stairwells that were nearly vertical, trying to reach rescue boats.
'We were crawling up a hallway, in the dark, with only the light from the life vest strobe flashing,' her mother, Georgia Ananias, 61, said. 'We could hear plates and dishes crashing, people slamming against walls.'
She choked up as she recounted the moment when an Argentine couple handed her their three-year-old daughter, unable to keep their balance as the ship lurched to the side and the family found themselves standing on a wall.
Mrs Ananias said: 'I grabbed the baby. But then I was being pushed down. I didn't want the baby to fall down the stairs. I gave the baby back. I couldn't hold her. 'I thought that was the end and I thought they should be with their baby,' she said.
The family said they were some of the last off the ship, forced to shimmy along a rope down the exposed side of the ship to a waiting rescue vessel.
Source: Daily Mail Uk
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