Recovery efforts at the site of the cruise ship disaster off the coast of Italy has entered a new phase Tuesday, with crews ready to remove oil from the wreckage. NBC's Michelle Kosinski reports.
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By NBC News and msnbc.com news services
Published at 9:10 a.m. ET: Officials say divers searching the toppled Costa Concordia have discovered another body in the submerged cruise ship.
The discovery on the third floor deck brings to 16 the number of bodies found since the Jan. 13 grounding. Officials at the Tuscan prefect's office said Tuesday they couldn't immediately confirm Italian news reports that the body was that of a woman.
At least six of the badly decomposed bodies remain unidentified, and are presumed to be among some of the 17 passengers and crew still unaccounted for.
The family of Jerry and Barbara Heil, a Minnesota couple missing in the disaster, posted on their blog Monday that they are still waiting for word about their parents. The Heils are the only Americans missing in the wreck.
Divers, meanwhile, continued blasting holes inside the steel-hulled ship to ease access for crews searching for the missing. The search and rescue operation will continue in tandem with the fuel removal operation.
A large platform carrying a crane and other equipment hitched itself to the shipwreck, signaling the start of preliminary operations to remove a half-million gallons of fuel from the ship's tanks before it leaks into the pristine Tuscan sea.
Actual pumping of the oil isn't expected to begin until Saturday, but officials from the Dutch shipwreck salvage firm Smit were working on the bow of the Concordia on Tuesday, making preparations to remove the fuel.
Officials have identified an initial six tanks that will be tapped, located in a relatively easy-to-reach area of the ship. Franco Gabrielli, head of the national civil protection agency, told reporters Tuesday that once the tanks are emptied, 50 percent of the fuel aboard the ship will have been extracted.
The pumping will continue 24 hours a day barring rough seas or technical glitches in this initial phase, he said.
"This is a complicated operation," Gabrielli warned. Smit has estimated the extraction operation could last a month.
Meanwhile,?Costa Cruises on Monday said it will ?refund the full cost of the cruise and the costs involved in reaching the embarkation port and the costs for getting home, the company said in a statement.
The company is facing more questions over its share of the blame for the shipwreck.
The criminal probe into the ship's doomed voyage may be widened, a lawyer for the ship's captain said Monday.
Survivors of the Costa Concordia are realizing the limits of their legal claims, as they signed away their rights when they bought their tickets. NBC's Kerry Sanders reports on what travelers should know.
Costa Cruises has not received any notification that it is being investigated, according to a company spokesman. The company will be forthright with investigators and has full faith in the magistrature, he added.
Captain Francesco Schettino is accused of steering the cruise ship too close to shore while performing a maneuver known as a "salute" in which liners draw up very close to land to make a display.
Schettino, who is charged with multiple manslaughter and with abandoning ship before the evacuation of passengers and crew was complete, has told prosecutors he had been instructed to perform the maneuver by operator Costa Cruises.
Pier Luigi Foschi, chairman and chief executive of Costa Cruises, has previously said that Schettino delayed issuing the SOS and evacuation orders and gave false information to the company headquarters.
Foschi, who visited Giglio Sunday, declined to respond to Schettino's allegation that he was instructed to perform the maneuver.
DigitalGlobe
The Costa Concordia, carrying more than 4,200 passengers, ran aground Jan. 13 off the coast of Italy. At least 15 people died in the accident, and rescuers continue to search for others missing.
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The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
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