Go on board! It's an order!

Here is a translation of the transcript of the conversation between Capt. Francesco Schettino, commander of the grounded Costa Concordia, and Capt. Gregorio De Falco of the Italian coast guard in Livorno.


If you want to listen to the actual conversation in Italian click HERE or on the Play Button

Go through the transcript and then answer the following questions, please

(1) How many instances of orders have you read?

• Less than 10

• More than 10

.
(2) Can you spot any polite requests?


(3) Can you list expressions or words that express anger?



—De Falco: "This is De Falco speaking from Livorno. Am I speaking with the commander?"

—Schettino: "Yes. Good evening, Cmdr. De Falco."

—De Falco: "Please tell me your name."

—Schettino: "I'm Cmdr. Schettino, commander"

—De Falco: "Schettino? Listen Schettino. There are people trapped on board. Now, go with your boat under the prow on the starboard side. There is a pilot ladder. You will climb that ladder and go on board. Go on board and then you will tell me how many people there are. Is that clear? I'm recording this conversation, Cmdr. Schettino..."

—Schettino: "Commander, let me tell you one thing..."

—De Falco: "Speak up! Put your hand in front of the microphone and speak more loudly, is that clear?"

—Schettino: "In this moment, the boat is tipping..."

—De Falco: "I understand that, listen, there are people that are coming down the pilot ladder of the prow. You go up that pilot ladder, get on that ship and tell me how many people are still on board. And what they need. Is that clear? You need to tell me if there are children, women or people in need of assistance. And tell me the exact number of each of these categories. Is that clear? Listen Schettino, that you saved yourself from the sea, but I am going to...really do something bad to you...I am going to make you pay for this. Go on board, (expletive)!"

—Schettino: "Commander, please..."

—De Falco: "No, please. You now get up and go on board. They are telling me that on board there are still..."

—Schettino: "I am here with the rescue boats, I am here, I am not going anywhere, I am here..."

—De Falco: "What are you doing, commander?"

—Schettino: "I am here to coordinate the rescue..."

—De Falco: "What are you coordinating there? Go on board! Coordinate the rescue from aboard the ship. Are you refusing?"

—Schettino: "No, I am not refusing."

—De Falco: "Are you refusing to go aboard commander? Can you tell me the reason why you are not going?"

—Schettino: "I am not going because the other lifeboat is stopped."

—De Falco: "Go aboard. It is an order. Don't make any more excuses. You have declared 'abandon ship.' Now I am in charge. Go on board! Is that clear? Do you hear me? Go, and call me when you are aboard. My air rescue crew is there."

—Schettino: "Where are your rescuers?"

—De Falco: "My air rescue is on the prow. Go. There are already bodies, Schettino."

—Schettino: "How many bodies are there?"

—De Falco: "I don't know. I have heard of one. You are the one who has to tell me how many there are. Christ."

—Schettino: "But do you realize it is dark and here we can't see anything..."

—De Falco: "And so what? You want go home, Schettino? It is dark and you want to go home? Get on that prow of the boat using the pilot ladder and tell me what can be done, how many people there are and what their needs are. Now!"

—Schettino: "...I am with my second in command."

—De Falco: "So both of you go up then ... You and your second go on board now. Is that clear?"

—Schettino: "Commander, I want to go on board, but it is simply that the other boat here ... there are other rescuers. It has stopped and is waiting..."

—De Falco: "It has been an hour that you have been telling me the same thing. Now, go on board. Go on board! And then tell me immediately how many people there are there."

—Schettino: "OK, commander"

—De Falco: "Go, immediately!"

Titanic and Costa Concordia: comparison

"Have you seen 'Titanic'? That's exactly what it was," said Valeria Ananias, a 31-year-old Los Angeles schoolteacher aboard the Concordia.

It seems that the world views the Concordia through a prism of fact, myth and fantasy that surrounds the Titanic, largely because of the popular movie that came out in 1997 and will be re-released in 3D this year.

Virtually everyone who has seen the movie has thought about what they would have done during such a disaster—and now the Concordia allows us to update and refresh those thoughts.

Are such comparisons to a 100-year-old tragedy fair? Accurate?

There is one comparison between the Concordia and Titanic that appears to be correct: Both were disasters affected by human error.












Please go through the following facts and state the similarities and the differences between the Titanic and the Concordia


The Titanic was the biggest ship built to date in England at that time—and the Concordia was the biggest ship built so far in Italy. One crashed into an iceberg, the other, a reef or rock.

The Concordia was slightly larger (952 feet to the Titanic's 883 feet) and both had a top speed of 23 knots.

Ominously, both had issues with their christening, and believers in superstition may attribute the ships' tragedies to it.

Before a ship's maiden voyage, it's common for a dignitary to "christen" the vessel by breaking a bottle of champagne on the hull for good luck.

The Titanic was never christened. The Concordia was christened during a ceremony when the ship came online, but the champagne bottle never broke. After each tragedy, people wondered whether the lack of a proper christening was a bad omen.

Christened in 2006, the Concordia was the largest and most luxurious in the Costa cruise fleet, boasting bars, restaurants, a gym, large spa and several lavish suites.

In its day, the Titanic had similar amenities—although there were more severe class differences on the Titanic, and the chasm between first- and third-class passengers was enforced by class-only eating, sitting and mingling areas. In today's cruising world, the passengers in the $199 cabins on the weekend cruises out of Miami can, and do, sun themselves alongside the folks in the $3,000 suites.

The Titanic had 2,207 people on board; the Concordia about 4,200. The Titanic was much smaller: 46,328 tons compared with the Concordia's 114,500 tons.

Safety standards for large passenger ships grew out of a convention in 1914, two years after the Titanic disaster—which means that all modern-day cruise ships, including the Concordia, should have benefited from the lessons learned from the Titanic. The rules eventually were adopted by the International Maritime Organization, an agency of the United Nations.

Ships are required to have public address systems for announcements to passengers, and lifeboats must be at least partially enclosed. They also must hold weekly "abandon ship" and fire drills.

Lifeboats also are required to be capable of being loaded, launched and maneuvered away from the ship within 30 minutes of the Master's signal to abandon ship.

People aboard the Titanic didn't panic because the ship listed only a few degrees. There weren't enough lifeboats for all of the passengers aboard and some lifeboats left without being full.



"It's amazing that 100 years later, we're still arguing about how many lifeboats are needed, what kind of training the crew had and what the evacuation procedures were," said Bob Jarvis, a maritime law professor at Nova Southeastern University in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. "One-hundred years later, we still don't do a good job getting passengers ready for a disaster."


Many passengers aboard the Concordia have complained the crew didn't give them good directions on evacuating and waited so long to lower the lifeboats that many couldn't be released because the ship was listing so heavily.

Some passengers also have complained that the Concordia's captain, Francesco Verusio, abandoned the cruise liner before all his passengers had escaped. The Titanic's captain, Edward Smith, died the night the ship sank. Some historians say he went down with the boat.

A century ago, people thought the Titanic was unsinkable because it was so large and mighty. Today, people marvel that a ship like the Concordia could have run aground while sailing a routine course.

"To see a ship like this in 2012, with all the sophisticated navigation equipment, doing something that it does every week, you don't expect that today," Jarvis said.


source: NYDispatch

Investigating Costa Concordia's black box (video)

You can also watch this video by clicking HERE or on the Play Button


(A) How about finishing these questions, based on the information provided in the video?

1. How many people …………
2. How many tons …….
3. When was the captain ………..
4. What are investigators ………
5. What did the captain ……
6. When did the ………
7. What do prosecutors ……….
8. Why did rescuers ……….



(B) Please organize a summary of the information including at least 15 of the following expressions


1. rescue workers
2. an Italian cruise ship
3. killed
4. were injured
5. missing
6. was arrested
7. has been accused of
8. navigation data recordings
9. sequence of events
10. calm seas and clear weather
11. consult the black boxes
12. captain
13. leaving the ship before
14. refused to return
15. unexplained delays
16. underestimated
17. safety
18. slipped slightly
19. deteriorated

Australian survives bungee jump that goes wrong

You can also watch this video by clicking HERE or on the Play Button




(A) How about filling in the blanks?


(Reuters) - An Australian woman ………………………… (survive) a terrifying fall after her bungee cord ………………………(snap) during a 111-meter leap off Africa's Victoria Falls Bridge, plunging her into the crocodile-infested Zambezi River below.

Erin Langworthy, the 22-year-old from Perth who ……………………….. (suffer) only cuts and bruises in the fall on New Year's Eve, said it ………………… (be) a "miracle" that she had survived the plunge into the rapids below the bridge, which ……………………. (border) Zambia and Zimbabwe.

But once in the water, she ……………….(be) far from safe - the river is notoriously infested with hungry crocodiles and she ……………… (be) certainly a meal these crocs ……………………….. (not want) miss.

Amazingly, with the hungry predators only feet away and before she ………………………. (enter) the rapids, Erin …………………… (manage) swim to the riverbank on the Zimbabwe side to wait for assistance.

Erin ……………………………..(treat) at a nearby clinic before ………………… (evacuate) to South Africa. Luckily she ………………………. (suffer) only minor injuries and can retell the bungee jump that nearly …………………….. (cost ) her her life.

Zambia's Information Minister Given Lubinda ……………………….. (say) in a report published on the Lusakatimes.com web site:

"The bungee …………………………. (be) a very viable operation considering that more than 50,000 tourists jump on it every year. It ……………………. (be) in operation for 10 years and this is the first time I …………………………. (hear) of an incident. The probability of an incident ………………… (be) one in 500,000 jumps"



(B) Are the following items mentioned in
1- the article,
2- the video or
3- both?

• Her name
• Her age
• Her nationality
• Her hometown
• The accident: when
• Bridge: place and height
• River: name and characteristics
• People witnessing the accident
• Rescue
• Treatment: where and how long
• African authorities
• Bungee jump operators

(C) Is there any item that gets a different description in the video and in the article?


(D) How about joining the following sentences using some of these linkers:

although - though - even though
since - as
however - yet - nevertheless - anyway
in spite of (the fact that)
due to (the fact that)
that's why
because of (the fact that)

1. The company that runs the bungee jump claims its plunges are safe. The Australian girl had a terrible accident.

2. She was told it was safe to jump. The rope snapped.

3. The rope snapped. She plummeted into the river.

4. She fell from a high bridge. She survived.

5. She survived. She's a good swimmer.

6. She's a good swimmer. She managed to unravel the rope bound around her feet.

7. Her legs were tied together with the bungee cord. She managed to pull herself to shore.

8. The Zambezi River is notoriously full of hungry crocodriles. None of them attacked Erin





edited from Reuters and NJD World