The mysteries surrounding the various stages of the Concordia disaster now entangle the top echelons of the Costa company, the Milan based daily Corriere della Sera says on its website.

Meanwhile, the ship has shited at least three times in the past few days towards deeper watyer, leading to suspension of efforts to find survivors or victims inside the vessel, media reports say. 

"Executives were told there were problems on board fully 68 minutes before the order to abandon ship was given but Captain Francesco Schettino does not appear to have been urged to announce the emergency straight away. Was the underestimation of the problem caused by the failure of Captain Schettino to report the scale of what was actually going on? Or did Costa executives think they could avoid serious financial consequences and thus become the captain’s accomplices in precipitating the disaster? These are the questions that the Grosseto public prosecutor’s is now seeking to answer, bearing in mind a detail that has come to light in the past few hours. Passengers traumatised during a cruise, for example by disembarking in liferafts at night on an island, are entitled to compensation of €10,000 each under maritime procedures. There were about 3,000 passengers on board, which means that total compensation could have been as much as €30 million," Corriere della Sera says..

A number of circumstances are still hard to explain. The latest of these is the fact that on the bridge there was a 25-year-old Moldovan woman who does appear on any list. Was she the captain’s guest? Why is there no record of her presence? Was she working without a contract? Some witnesses have mentioned the woman, saying her name is Domnika. Public prosecutor Francesco Verusio has asked Carabinieri to find her since she appears in a photograph taken not long after the Concordia’s departure from Civitavecchia. Officers will have to discover why she was on board and where she was at the moment of impact. According to some witnesses, she was in a room next to the control room. Did she see or hear anything that might throw light on what happened? Did she stay there even in the confusion that followed the collision with the reef? Captain Schettino undoubtedly realised that the situation was serious but the decisions he then took appear incomprehensible, reinforcing suspicions that he took them in agreement with the company and not on his own. Despite Costa’s chairman and CEO Pier Luigi Foschi dissociating himself from Captain Schettino, they are marching to the same drum. Proof is there in the fact that the commander is still being guaranteed legal assistance, as Mr Foschi himself confirmed three days ago when he referred to “the human error committed by the commander”. On Friday evening, it was still possible to remedy the error but Costa’s executives gave no order for an immediate evacuation. This would have enabled all the passengers to reach safety because the liner remained upright on its axis for almost an hour. Using the lifeboats would have removed any risk.

Instead, 68 precious minutes were wasted, the time that elapsed between former commander Mario Palombo’s call at 9.50 pm to a Costa manager and 10.58 pm, when the seven emergency blasts rang out to tell passengers to abandon ship. So far, it has been established that Captain Schettino spoke on the phone three times to Roberto Ferrarini, the man in charge of Costa’s crisis unit. However, evidence gathered suggests that consultations in the critical period of time involved other company staff. In particular, there are thought to have been contacts with others on board the Concordia. Significantly, Carabinieri and financial police officers have been asked to verify the tasks assigned to officers and ratings because as things stand, some appear to have carried out operations incompatible with their role. The aim is clearly to reconstruct the chain of command and discover what “advice” was given to Schettino by Costa executives. Investigators also want to find out who took the captain’s place when he abandoned the ship. Only when all the checks have been completed will Mr Ferrarini and his safety-sector colleagues be asked to account for what turned out to be a deadly chain of events. It now seems that investigators are convinced that responsibility cannot laid solely at the commanding officer’s door, the report says..