Costa Cruises issued a statement saying "preliminary indications are that there may have been significant human error on the part of the ship's Master, Captain Francesco Schettino."
In real estate it is all about location, location, location. When navigating close to land it would appear that there is a similar needed focus on "knowing where you are at all times." More will surely come out about what was happening on the bridge of the ship just before impact and immediately after the ship hit underwater rocks.
As I had indicated in my first blog posting on the accident, human error is almost always a contributing factor in any accident. The actions of the Captain and crew after knowing they hit something will also be dissected intensely by the investigating authorities. Just as in the Titanic, there seems to have been a delay in taking prompt action to begin evacuation of the ship. Or, at least in being prepared to evacuate the ship.
I understand the need for a quick damage estimation, but you can get the ball rolling on evacuation by alerting people and having them become prepared and positioned to evacuate. As we emergency managers know, it takes a bit of time to get people to take action even when the warning has been given. The need to verify what others are doing and then to align one's actions with others is part of human nature. The disaster researchers call it "milling."
This would be an interesting project to look at the use of social media "on the ship" to see what was being said at the time of the accident.
