THE semi-submerged remains of the biggest cruise ship ever capsized is still at sea. The besieged captain awaits trial and the biggest salvage mission ever undertaken has begun.
MARIO Pellegrini is somewhat of a hero on Giglio island.
When a year ago today the Costa Concordia sank just off the port entrance, the deputy mayor not only rushed out to the ship but climbed a rope ladder to get aboard to help in the leadership void left by the fleeing captain Francesco Shettino - dubbed internationally as Captain Coward.
Pellegrini never saw his actions that day as heroic, rather just something that needed to be done, helping and directing dozens of passengers off the badly listing ship.
Today, as the first anniversary of the disaster takes place and a memorial is held to recognise the 32 lives lost that night of the sinking, he said the scenes he encountered still haunt him.
''I remember the children crying, I can still see the faces of the little children,'' he said yesterday.
Giglio's police chief Roberto Galli was the first person to talk with the ship's captain after the incident. Picture: Ferguson John
''There was screaming and crying but it's the children I remember.''
He said everyone in town struggled with the tragedy one way or another.
''It is impossible to return Giglio to the way it was prior to January 2012,'' he said.
''The impact of the crash with real life is very strong and it's impossible to change. Before people would ask me where is Giglio, now Giglio is well known and forever will be associated with the Costa Concordia.''
A view of the shipwreck from the island of Giglio. Picture: John Ferguson
Local police chief Roberto Galli was at home when he heard a boom and rushed into town fearing a fire or worse.
What he saw instead on that cool evening a year ago today was instead a massive gleaming white ship bathed in a blaze of lights, listing badly.
''Everybody in the village rushed to their boats to help, it was obviously a big disaster the likes of which we had never seen,'' the Giglio Island police chief recalled yesterday.
By the time he raced around the foreshore, survivors in lifeboats and others who swam had made it to the island's rocky foreshore and there among them he spotted the epaulletes of a ship's captain.
''He (Schettino) told me he was the captain and I offered to take him back to the ship to help in the rescue of passengers but he refused, he said it was better for him to stay ashore and coordinate things from here. I couldn't believe it and nothing I said could convince him to return to the ship to help the many many people I could see scrambling to get off.''
He said all the locals did what they could to help and today could live their lives safe in the knowledge they helped in saving lives.
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