White Nights - The Costa Concordia Crew pulls an All-nighter

The amazing salvage operation of righting the downed cruise ship, The Costa Concordia, that had it looking like a beached whale since that fateful night when the Captain, showing off to his on-board hooker, finally came to a close as it pulled into the Genova (Genoa) harbour.  Crews worked day & night to first perch the ship on a ledge so it would not slide down onto the sea bed, destroying the natural habitat, and then righting the ship and finally, getting it to float - to then move up the coast to where it will be dismantled.

An amazing simulation video of the entire operation is here: 

http://video.ilsole24ore.com/SoleOnLine5/Video/Notizie/Italia/2013/concordia-rimozione/videoremoval.php

The French stirred up a fuss when they heard that Italians would be dragging the ship near the Corsica coast.  And so they sent out a pollution containment boat to "monitor" the process, as if yes, that would do the trick if the Concordia started leaking god knows what  hydrocarbons (no, I'm not smarter than a 5th grader) and muddying up the Mediterranean.  To put things in perspective, the boat is 60000 tons of steel - the Empire State Building is 57000.

So in this 24/7 and 2 1/2 year rescue operation came to a close, the Captain of the party ship decided he would celebrate the completion in the best way possible: By attending a White Party on the island of Ischia.  

Picture by Ischia Online Newspaper, Il Golfo

Issuing a statement as he wound his way thru the crowd, Schettino said that "Being on an island was as close as he could come to actually being near the island of Giglio" and "Wearing white is a sign of respect for those poor people who died so needlessly that night."  Schettino went on to say that by showing he was ready to move on with his life, and others (except, of course, those who perished) should do the same.  In short, by 'living it up' he was an example for all.

To the rest of us, left wondering what happened to House Arrest, Schettino said "House music, Arrested Development, just mix it in like a Buon Mojito, and all troubles will pass." 

Schettino bares his soul...

*White nights or, Notte Bianche are what Italians call all-nighters.

Italy...After raising the Concordia

From the inimitable genius of Gianni Falcone www.gianfalco.it 

His is the hand behind my cartoon of the week (see tab on the home page of my blog, Burnt by the Tuscan Sun).

Now this....is gonna be a tough one to set straight.

Although the entire world has weighed in on this debacle:  From the 32 dead (two people still not recovered), the mind-boggling idiocy of the Captain and his utterly ludicrous self defense,  to the recent conviction of five crew members for manslaughter, to the expense of the salvage operation (eventually topping out over $1 billion),  I thought the commentary from Metro newspaper's Maurizio Guandalini was quite poignant [he invites us to make our own inference, which for me is the end of the Berlusconi govt and over to Monti's temporary govt before the elections that brought us the young Letta]:

"...we've raised up from the ashes what was vanquished a year and a half ago.  Whatever way you think on it, just know that they're watching us from the four corners of the earth.  Between the control room and the decision room, our Made in Italy name was totally putrified.  But with a nod from Leonardo Da Vinci, on the edges of a Tuscan island, we deployed our utmost genius and technical abilities."