Who Commands?

A ship at sea is commanded by its captain who has absolute power over those on board.  At least that's what underlies so many stories and adventures and, presumably, the concept of mutiny.  It is that absolute power and hence absolute responsibility that enables a dangerous environment to be effectively mastered.

That is what I'd always thought, if I thought about it at all.  But the reports of the shipwreck of the Concordia give another account of who commands.   There seems to have been a complete breakdown of responsibilities.   Having hit the Island of Giglio at 28 kilometres an hour, bringing the ship's speed instantly to 6 kilometres an hour (imagine being inside with no warning, not wearing your  seatbelt would take on forceful meaning) the captain is reported to have got on the phone to the director of marine operations of the company that owned the boat.  And stayed on the phone for three calls-worth plus a call from a retired former captain in Grosseto.  The Second Officer has gone down to the engine room and found it full of water - and all electrical power sources flooded - the only power was a small emergency generator elsewhere in the ship.  He tells the bridge that the ship is without any means of control.  And the captain gets on the phone again.

Time passes: the ship is still upright, it will remain so for nearly an hour, time enough to lower all the life boats.  After 40 minutes of drifting it is driven further onto  rocks and starts to tilt.  The other officers start the evacuation procedures although the captain is still   on the telephone, now denying to the Capitaneria di Livorno that the ship needs help.  He then leaves the ship with another (Greek) officer.

By this time the Carabinieri of Prato!!  (Prato is a few kilometres west of Florence, you couldn't get further from the sea in Italy if you tried) have declared the emergency.    The Capitaneria, having asserted their acquisition of authority over the ship, calls the captain of the Concordia  who is  now safely on the shore and orders him back onto the Concordia to take charge of the evacuation of the people on board.  He takes the first ferry to Porto Santo Stefano.

There seem to have  been two mutinies:  of the officers against the captain, and  of the captain against the Capitaneria.  And a ceding of authority to a commercial organisation, far from the shipwreck,  which was not helping with the timely provision of plans of the ship or accurate lists of those on board.  This is not just a matter of acts of bravado or cowardice or stupidity or  criminality.

Who commands a vessel in Italian waters, or any other waters, and to what laws are they answering?

AND (for those who understand Italian) here is the phone call asserting command (it starts a short way in).  The furious voice speaking in beautiful Tuscan is from the Capitaneria , the Neapolitan voice ordered to put its mouth in front of the telephone and speak up, is that of the captain of the Concordia.