When I saw the film, The Poseidon Adventure, within
weeks of its release in 1972, I was just fourteen years old, and it
made a powerful impression. The plot featured a cruise ship
beginning to sink, with most of the passengers choosing to heed the
crew’s instructions to stay in the main common areas until they can
be rescued. Gene Hackman played a fiery pastor who convinces a
small band of followers to climb upward through the listing ship to
its highest point, braving a series of harrowing obstacles which
deplete their ranks by a few.
In the end only they are saved. Those who abided by the
official policy were all lost — echoing the famous poem “The Boy
Stood on the Burning Deck” — when the ship sank moments after
Hackman’s team was rescued.
Inspired by the poignancy of the movie, I went to the
library and took out the book it was based on, authored by the
great Paul Gallico, famed sports editor of the New York Daily
News. When I reached the climax of the novel, I was shocked
that the result was the opposite of the movie ending. The
passengers who had stayed put were all saved without a single
casualty. The only people to die after the initial impact were
those who had failed to survive the obstacle course preferred by
the wacky cleric.
The astonishing saga of the sinking Italian cruise ship,
Costa Concordia,
continued to unfold after the weekend with the discovery of two
live passengers and one crew member with a broken leg, along with
five more corpses to bring the total to eleven known victims of the
event. Two dozen more are still unaccounted for, as divers ply
their gritty chore of searching the severely listing
vessel.
The captain of the ship, nominally its commander tasked
with the safety of his passengers, escaped at the earliest
opportunity, along with the First Mate. The Italian Coast Guard
released a tape in which the captain cringes, waffles, mumbles,
fumbles, truckles… anything but returning to fulfill his
duty.
Most of the 4,200 people on board were saved anyway, but
it took some doing on the part of some more responsible crew
members and other heroes, including many of the dancers and musical
performers. But the rank cowardice of the ostensible leadership was
an extra stink bomb lobbed into the wreckage. It takes a sensitive
human tragedy and tinges it with crude farce.
The episode this calls to mind is one it eerily mirrors,
the grounding of the Oceanos in 1991 off the Wild Coast of
South Africa. In that case, the Greek Captain evacuated first with
all of the top crew members, leaving an anarchic vacuum which was
filled mostly by the entertainment staff. The woman in charge of
fun and games on board in happier times alertly sensed the void and
stepped in to assume the leadership role. Amazingly, every single
person was rescued by either lifeboat or helicopter. It is well
worth the time to see the entire Dateline
report chronicling the fiasco turned
virtuoso.
The word “coward” is structured ingeniously, including the
entirety of “war” but hiding it by smothering from both sides. When
the captains all turn out to be cowards, opting for years in a dry
jail over hours facing the music in a seaborne dance with the Angel
of Death, while the musicians and the dancers rise to the occasion,
there is some great lesson to be learned here in assaying the human
condition.
The Talmud famously teaches that in a bustling marketplace
one day, Elijah the Prophet could point out only two individuals
who were heading to Heaven. They were two comedians who made a
specialty of cheering up the unfortunate, helping people through
crises in their lives.
The story of these cruise ships supports the central
insight of that vignette. The captain, who strutted around thinking
that it was all about him, could only think of himself when the
Heavens tested his mettle. The singers and the dancers, training
themselves to please and satisfy the needs of others, were well
positioned to put the welfare of the group above saving their own
skins.
The next time I am aboard a cruise ship and I get that
little gilt-edged envelope with the invitation to join the captain
at his table, remind me to seek out the entertainment staff as
companions instead. Some of these captains are not fit for the high
seas; their place is in the dock.
