Pier Luigi Foschi has been talking about retiring from Costa for some time now, but this is probably not the way he expected to depart from the company. He had always planned on retiring when he hit 65 (which was last fall), and Costa’s parent company, Carnival Corp. has stated that his retiring is not related to the fatal crash of the Costa Concordia that happened over 5 months ago.
Foschi will be replaced by Michael Thamm, who is president of Carnival Corp.’s German cruise operator AIDA Cruises.
Gianni Onorato will continue to serve as president of Costa Cruises. Michael Ungerer, a longtime senior executive at AIDA Cruises, will become president.
Foschi is set to retire in July of this year, but he may be remembered mostly for his words after the Costa Concordia crash.
Within days of the shipwreck, the CEO blamed Costa Concordia Captain Francesco Schettino for taking the ship away from its given path and coming to close to the shoreline, calling it “human error”. In a press conference he also tried to comfort the families of those involved in the wreck as well as encourage future cruisers to use the company’s services.
Captain Schettino is under house arrest while the Italian authorities investigate the incident.
OMG….Thank goodness Carnival is waking up to the reality of the situation….Costa is lead by the leader….Now the leader Retires….YEAH
Your sympathy has been false and not real your actions towards passengers when the accident happened, and even how you are treating passengers now DOES NOT show Sympathy or Understanding…….Costa almost killed 4229 people and killed 32 people…… But you spend millions on new premises…..Finally the right thing…..Good bye Pier Luigi….You will Not Be Missed!!