Costa Concordia Captain to Release Book About 2012 Disaster

rancesco Schettino (C) arriving at Giglio harbour February 27, 2014 before returning to the ship for the first time since the disaster along with experts investigating the capsize. REUTERS/Alessandro Bianchi

Francesco Schettino, the former captain of the Coast Concordia, has written about the 2012 disaster in a new 600-page book that promises to give his version of the story. 

Francesco Schettino was in command of the Costa Concordia when it wrecked along Italian island of Giglio in January 2012, killing 32 people people. In February, Schettino was sentenced to 16 years in prison after an Italian court found him guilty of multiple counts of manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning ship with passengers still onboard. Schettino has remained free as he appeals the conviction. 

The book, called “Le Verità Sommerse” (translating to “The Truth Submerged”), was co-written with the Italian journalist Vittoriana Abate and presented Wednesday during an event at Schettino’s hometown of Meta, Italy, near Naples.

The book will serve as a memoir for the former Captain, detailing his life before, during and after the disaster. Schettino hopes the book will set the record straight about what really happened that night through his own “minute by minute” account and evidence presented during trial. 

Since the disaster, Schettino has become the object of ridicule in the media after he claimed to have tripped and fell into the lifeboat and refused Coast Guard orders to return to the ship in a now famous audio recording released in court. 

During his trial, Schettino’s defense team argued that he prevented an even worse disaster by steering the ship close to shore as it sank. 

The wreck Costa Concordia was salvaged in July 2014 and is currently being dismantled in Genoa, Italy. 

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