Ammon News - AMMONNEWS - One more survivor has been found aboard the overturned Costa Concordia cruise ship that ran aground off the coast of Italy, reports say.

Luca Cari, a spokesman for the fire department, said on Sunday that rescuers had spoken to the person inside the ship but the survivor had not yet been removed.

This comes as rescue crews managed to evacuate to safety two other survivors during a night-time operation on Saturday.

The survivors, a South Korean couple who were on their honeymoon, were discovered on the ship's lower deck.

The captain of the ship, Francesco Schettino, has meanwhile been detained on suspicion of manslaughter after at least three people were found dead as a result of the accident on Friday.

Thousands of people were evacuated to safety after the ship hit an obstacle and tipped over. Some 40 remain unaccounted-for.

Police divers and rescue crews continue to circle the wreckage in an apparent search for other survivors.

'Formidable' sight

Authorities have launched an investigation into the cause of the accident. Schettino had reportedly left the stricken cruise liner "well before" the last passengers were evacuated, the prosecutor in charge of investigating the disaster told the news channel SkyTG24 on Sunday.

"At around 8:00pm (19:00 GMT) the 290-metre-long Costa Concordia cruise ship ... began taking on water and tilting over by around 20 degrees," the coast guard said in a statement on Saturday.

The vessel was taking in water through a 50m hole in its hull on Saturday, and the condition of the vessel appeared to be worsening.

"The ship is a pretty formidable sight, to say the least, and you can clearly see the enormous gash as rescue operations are still taking place," Al Jazeera's Sonia Gallego reported from a firefighting boat nearby on Saturday.

Most of the 3,200 passengers and 1,000 crew members had already been evacuated to safety. Dozens were also injured in the accident, at least two of them seriously.

Helicopters were used to help rescuers, and passengers were transferred to the mainland at Porto Santo Stefano.

Italian authorities said they were trying to find room to accommodate the rescued passengers, including pregnant women and children.

Two French tourists and Peruvian crew member were confirmed to be dead. Authorities fear the casualty figure could rise beyond that.

One of the victims was a man in his 70s who died of a heart attack caused by the shock to his system when he jumped into the icy waters, reports said.

The 114,500-tonne Costa Concordia was on a trip around the Mediterranean when it "hit an obstacle" near the island of Giglio off the coast of Tuscany.

'No control'

Some passengers heard a loud bang and were initially told the ship had shuddered to a halt for electrical reasons, before being told to put on their life-jackets.

Many were eating dinner and some were in their cabins at the time of the accident.


Emily Lau, a passenger, told Al Jazeera on Saturday that people were afraid as the ship began to tilt.

She said that crew members tried to reassure the passengers, but that they had trouble handling the situation.

"When we got to the deck, people were just utterly hysterical, mostly not because something was scary, but because there was no control.

"It was just utter madness. People were falling because the ship was actually sinking quite fast. And the next thing we heard was 'abandon ship'," Lau said.

"We had to embark onto our lifeboats, and people were rushing onto the lifeboats and there was no order of any sort. No one told us what to do," she said.

The Costa Crociera company, which owns the vessel, said that it was not yet possible to say what caused the problem, but that the evacuation had been fast.

"The ship was on a cruise in the Mediterranean, leaving from Savona with planned stops in Civitavecchia, Palermo, Cagliari, Palma, Barcelona and Marseille," the company said.

Costa Concordia was built in 2004-2005 at a cost of 450 million euros at the Fincantieri Sestri shipyard in Italy.



* Al Jazeera and agencies