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Cruise captain: I felt ship slip
08/04/2007 17:11 - (SA)
Athens - The captain of the sunken Sea Diamond cruise ship blamed currents off a Greek island for last week's accident, state-run television reported on Sunday.
Two French tourists have been missing since Thursday when the ship struck rocks and eventually sank off the holiday island of Santorini.
All the other people on board - 1 154 passengers and 391 crew, according to operator Louis Cruise Lines - were rescued.
The ship's Greek captain has been charged with negligence and released pending further testimony.
State-run NET television quoted from what it said were excerpts of his deposition to a public prosecutor on the island of Naxos, blaming currents off the volcanic island for the accident.
"I felt the ship, which had been on a normal course, slip to the right because of sea currents," NET quoted him as saying. "I gave the order for a full turn left. But there was not enough time for the ship to respond."
The captain was indicted along with five other crew members on blanket charges of causing a shipwreck through negligence, breaching international shipping safety regulations and polluting the environment, the Cyclades islands public prosecution office said.
Most of the ship's passengers were American, but they also included groups from Canada, Spain, France, Australia and the Dominican Republic.
The missing passengers were identified as Frenchman Jean-Christophe Allain, 45, and his 16-year-old daughter, Maud. Allain's wife reported them missing.
Efforts to search the vessel for their possible remains were set to resume on Tuesday, with the help of a remote-controlled undersea probe that will be used to examine the vessel more than 100m below the surface.
- AP
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