Russel Rebello, an Indian waiter, is the last person still missing from the disaster on 13 January 2012. Thirty one others are known to have died during or after the chaotic evacuation of the vessel.
A handful of surviving passengers of the wrecked Costa Concordia cruise ship filed a lawsuit against the cruise line on Friday, the same day the company offered each of the hundreds who'd been aboard the vessel a lump sum of 11,000 euros ($14,400).
The court heard how some passengers were sucked into a vortex of water rushing into the ship when the Concordia capsized. This happened after the crew told them to go to the other side of the ship where lifeboats were being launched, and the passengers ended up trying to walk down a tilting corridor.
In the United States, there is no explicit law requiring a captain to remain on their ship, but they could face criminal charges if they acted with negligence or extreme disregard for human life in abandoning a vessel in distress or causing a maritime accident in the first place.
Size of ships: The Titanic was 882 feet and 8 inches long (268 meters) and had a tonnage of 46,000. The Costa Concordia was larger, with a tonnage of 114,500 and a length of 951 feet and 5 inches (290 m). The width of the Titanic was 92.5 feet (28 m), compared with 118 feet (36 m) for the Costa Concordia.
There's a special place, however, for those who commit serious crimes at sea — the ship's jail, or “brig” in nautical terms. These steel rooms are located on one of the bottom decks of the vessel, usually near the security office. And if you end up down there, you won't be staying there for the duration of the cruise.
There is no question of repair: instead the Costa Concordia will be towed to a facility where she can be broken up and smelted down to be recycled and re-used.
The Italian court trying the captain of the Costa Concordia has heard grim details about how the 32 victims of the shipwreck drowned, some after diving or falling into the sea from the capsized cruise liner when lifeboats were no longer accessible.
In its investigative report on the 2012 disaster, Italy's Ministry of Infrastructures and Transports found that the Concordia “was sailing too close to the coastline, in a poorly lit shore area…at an unsafe distance at night time and at high speed (15.5 kts).”
The Icon of the Seas, set to sail in the Caribbean in January, is five times the size of the Titanic. But it's unlikely to ever meet the same fate as the iconic ship, thanks to radar and iceberg monitoring. Royal Caribbean also says their cruise ships have enough lifeboats and rafts for everyone on board.
The sinking of RMS Titanic in April 1912 remains the worst, and the most infamous, cruise ship disaster in history. The sinking of the biggest passenger ship ever built at the time resulted in the death of more than 1,500 of the 2,208 people onboard.
Cruise ships are designed to be incredibly safe and reliable, so thankfully they don't sink very often. In fact, the last major cruise ship sinking was in 2012 when the Costa Concordia capsized off the coast of Italy.