Rome, Italy, Jan 18, 2012 / 22:23 pm
The Catholic chaplain of the sunken cruise ship Costa Concordia has defended the ship’s crew from reports they were negligent towards passengers during the maritime disaster.
Fr. Rafaeli Mallena was “very upset” by initial reports that indicated the crew was not taking care of passengers.
“But I am a personal witness of people leaving their families and children and I saw personal sacrifice. There was a staff captain, for example, who saved three or four people who could not swim,” the chaplain said, according to Fr. Giacomo Martino, national director of Italy’s Apostleship of the Sea.
Fr. Mallena, who is 70, went to the ship’s chapel after he heard the first sounds of collision. Forty minutes later, hearing the “abandon ship” alarm, he consumed the Eucharist and locked the staff’s valuables in a safe.