Costa Concordia salvage master sends thanks to Giglio

Specialist oversaw parbuckling operation on shipwreck

(ANSA) - Grossetto, August 4 - South African salvage master Nick Sloane thanked the people of Giglio Monday as he prepared to leave the Tuscan island and his work in salvaging the stricken Costa Concordia.

At the same time, he was given a harbor tribute as he bid farewell to the American-Italian team that worked on the complex removal of the cruise ship that crashed in January 2012, killing 32 people. "Thanks for your support over these past 27/28 months that we have been on Giglio," Sloane said in a letter published on the island's website, Giglionews.net. "The Costa Concordia was a bigger challenge than any of us thought, 'way back in May of 2012 - we knew it would be difficult, but that was an understatement," Sloane wrote.

As the senior salvage master, Sloan oversaw the complex but ultimately successful parbuckling operation to upright the partially sunken cruise liner last autumn. Sloane's letter thanked the people of Giglio for their "exceptional" hospitality.

The massive Costa Concordia wreck was removed from the Tuscan island on July 23 and slowly towed up the coast to a port in Genoa where the 114,500-tonne liner will be turned into scrap. The saga of the deadly disaster will continue for some time to come in the criminal courts, with former captain Francesco Schettino on trial on multiple charges of manslaughter, causing a shipwreck, and abandoning the ship before it was evacuated.