Every man for himself. It’s been a rough month for Francesco Schettino, the captain of the cruise liner Costa Concordia, which ran aground this month and partially sank off of the Island of Giglio in Italy. The death toll as of press time had risen to 11 after Italian naval divers used explosives to make holes in the ship’s hull in an effort to find more of the missing passengers.
The transcript of the conversation between Schettino and the port authority was released, and in it an official at the authority is ordering the captain to return to his ship.
“There are people trapped on the boat,” the official says. “Now you take your dinghy and go back to the ship.”
The captain replies, “Listen, commander, let me tell you one thing ... The ship is on its side.”
“Listen Schettino,” the official says, “you may have been saved by the sea, but I can assure you I can make you go through a lot of trouble. Get on board now.”
Schettino continued to give excuses for why he cannot return to the boat, saying that it is dark, that he is coordinating the rescue effort and that another dinghy that would transport him to the ship is stalled. But he at last gives in and tells the official, “I’m going instantly.”
Captain Schettino, 52, is under arrest for manslaughter and abandoning his passengers on the ship, and is being held in custody for fear of being a flight risk.
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The recent Standard and Poor’s downgraded credit ratings of France, Italy and seven other countries reinforced that the financial problems of Europe are not over.
There are 17 nations that use the euro, and all are at risk of a downgrade, according to S&P, who say politicians have moved too slowly to make the monetary union stronger and could possibly send Europe into another recession, which would be the second in three years.
The only euro zone nations that kept their AAA ratings, were Germany, the Netherlands, Finland and Luxembourg.
Kerry Mayo with Forbes says that there are still a few solutions that economists believe may solve the European debt crisis. One is for the European Central Bank (ECB) to purchase the debt of the distressed countries. This should create demand for the bonds, which will make their prices move higher and lower costs of interest.
However, Mayo says, “there are several problems with this solution.” Unlike the Federal Reserve (Fed) in United States, the ECB has no mandate to promote full employment. The ECB is only charged with maintaining price stability. The ECB is not a lender of last resort and is not charged with spurring economic growth like the Fed is. For the ECB to buy bonds, it must issue bonds backed by the European Union itself. A few billion in bond sales at a time is not going to do much to solve the crisis.
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Authorities have asked for landowners near the northern North Dakota-Montana border to continue looking for signs of the missing Montana teacher’s buried body. Sherry Arnold, a 43-year old math teacher from Sidney, Mont., has been missing since Jan. 7 and is thought to be dead.
There are two suspects in the case who have been arrested and detained on aggravated kidnapping charges: 47-year-old Lester Vann Waters Jr. and 22-year-old Michael Keith Spell, both of Parachute, Colo.
Records in Florida show Waters has a criminal history in that state and has served prison time. He has felony convictions for driving without a valid license and leaving the scene of an injury crash. Spell, court records show, was arrested in May 2007 in Colorado on charges of drug possession, contributing to the delinquency of a minor and sexual contact without consent – but the charges were dropped five months later. Records do not say why.