AFP/DPA/Rome

A crewmember testified yesterday that Costa Concordia captain Francesco Schettino was “too calm” during the cruise ship tragedy that claimed 32 lives last year.
“It was too calm on the bridge considering what was happening,” said Giovanni Iaccarino, describing at Schettino’s trial the events after the ship hit rocks off the island of Giglio on the night of January 14, 2012.
“We were telling the bridge that everything was out of order,” he told the court in Grosseto, the city nearest to the site of the crash, where the trial against Schettino began in July.
Iaccarino went down to the engine room to see for himself after the impact of the crash, as water flooded into the ship through a gash in its side.
“It seems they did not realise the gravity of the situation,” he said, adding: “They were saying ‘okay, received’ but they were not giving orders.”
He said he saw Schettino later, as the ship keeled over, and that “he was trying to help but he seemed lost, he did not seem the person I knew”.
“I looked at the nautical map and I saw that we were ... close to Giglio’s reefs. I looked at the panel and it was full of red lights. Then Commander Schettino ran his hands through his hair and said: ‘I made a mess’,” Iaccarino said.
Iaccarino, who had been summoned by the prosecution, was the first of more than 1,000 witnesses due to appear in a trial where the Costa Concordia captain is accused of manslaughter, abandoning ship and other serious crimes.
The Costa Concordia hit a group of rocks near the shore of Giglio with 4,229 people from 70 countries on board and keeled over.
The trial is set to last for months longer, with hundreds of witnesses expected to testify.
Schettino, who was present at the hearing, risks a jail term of up to 20 years, according to prosecutors. His lawyers retort that he is being made a scapegoat, while organisational and security shortcomings on the Concordia are overlooked.
Judges in Grosseto, central Italy, heard from Iaccarino that on the night of the disaster the captain ordered the crew to sail at a distance of half a nautical mile from Giglio, rather than the normal five nautical miles.
Schettino had wanted the Concordia to carry out the stunt off Giglio during another cruise seven days earlier, “but it was not possible because the conditions were not right, the sea was too rough and the idea was abandoned”, Iaccarino said.
The officer said he was off duty, in his cabin, when the Concordia ran aground.
He had been “playing at the PlayStation” with cartographer Simone Canessa, he told the court. “I figured that we either had a collision or we had got stuck.”