Cruise ship crash toll rises to seven, as 28 remain missing

Rescuers found a body in the wreckage early this morning, raising the death toll to seven.

The head of the Italian coastguard, Marco Brusco, said there was "a glimmer of hope" for finding more survivors since the giant half-submerged vessel had not yet been fully inspected, but rescuers said the chances were now slim.

Brusco said four crew members and 25 tourists including six Italians remained unaccounted for.

A German official said at least 10 German nationals were still missing and two US nationals were also yet to be found.

Three of the victims - two French passengers and one Peruvian crew member -- drowned after jumping into the chilly Mediterranean waters to escape.

Choppy seas forced rescuers to temporally evacuate the 17-deck Costa Concordia for several hours yesterday after the ship slipped on a rocky shelf under the sea, sparking fears that the hulk could sink entirely.

Giglio's mayor Sergio Ortelli warned that the stricken vessel, which hit submerged rocks and keeled over off the island holiday spot, was an "ecological time-bomb" in the pristine waters of a marine nature reserve.

The head of the company that owns the vessel said it had hit a rock as a result of an "inexplicable" error by the captain, Francesco Schettino, who was arrested on Saturday along with first officer Ciro Ambrosio.

"He carried out a manoeuvre which had not been approved by us and we disassociate ourselves from such behaviour," said Pier Luigi Foschi, the boss of Costa Crociere, Europe's largest cruise operator.

Italian prosecutors accuse Schettino and Ambrosio of abandoning ship before all the passengers were rescued.

A transcript of a conversation between Schettino and a port official was released yesterday showing that the captain refused to return to the ship.

"You must tell us how many people, children, women and passengers are there and the exact number of each category," the official tells Schettino, according to the transcript of the conversation on one of the ship's "black boxes".

"What are you doing? Are you abandoning the rescue?" the official says.

The Costa Concordia was carrying more than 4,200 people when it ran aground shortly after starting a seven-day Mediterranean cruise on its way to Marseille in France and Barcelona in Spain, just as many passengers were having dinner.

Carnival Corp, the parent company of Costa Crociere, put the initial cost of the disaster €75 million.

The Corriere della Sera reported that the captain had passed close to the island's rocky shores to please the head waiter who comes from Giglio.

It also quoted witnesses as claiming the waiter had warned Schettino just before the accident happened: "Careful, we are extremely close to the shore."

Crews on Monday put down anti-spill booms as fears of a leak of the ship's 2,380 tons of fuel rose and local officials called for strict curbs in the future on shipping routes in an area of outstanding natural beauty.

A Dutch company specialising in salvage operations, Smit, was to begin pumping out the fuel this week. Officials said the ship itself could then be taken off Giglio in an unprecedented operation using massive floating devices.

Passengers meanwhile described confusion on board as the lights went out and how they were at first told it was just an electrical fault -- before the ship lurched sharply on to its side and panic set in.