>> but we have been watching him since he was, what? 10 or 12 years old. >> does it mean we have short attention spans? i don't know. >> michael jackson has died. >> farrah fawcett has died. >> south carolina governor mark sanford -- >> i any we've all become accustomed now that there's always another big story on the heels of the one before it. there were many dreams add nightmares after the disaster. >> the boat is sinking. >> i see myself on that boat still trying to get out. >> different scenarios of shipwrecks and what i would do and usually ends with me dying.

>> that floating life jacket, saying good-bye to my kids. >> you never get to sleep at all. you never get any rest because your brain is constantly asking you to revisit all of those horrible things. >> that feeling of isolation, that feeling of aloneness, that feeling of being lost. >> there are things that's bigger than you that you cannot conquer on your own, not even with love, not even with family. >> i survived -- >> i survived -- >> i survived. >> i survived the wreck of the "costa concordia." welcome to "dateline extra." i'm tamron hall. they were sold a five-star experience. the passengers that boarded the "costa concordia" in january

2012 for a seven-day mediterranean cruise and high expectations as they watched the ship fade into the distance, bound for some of the most beautiful cities. soon they'd all be locked in a life-or-death struggle to escape. 32 of them didn't survive. this is the story of six who did in their own words with personal detail and raw emotion, telling what happened one tragic night aboard the ship that had it all. here's "the wreck of the "costa concordia."" >> i had never seen a ship this big. just the size of it. how does a human being build something like this? >> it looked like a hotel. >> it was huge. and it was beautiful. >> marble floor, wood panelling. there's brass and glass and just all sorts of ornamentation and it was really like stepping into

a whole different world. >> it was massive. it was just completely insane. >> we got on to the "costa concordia" on january 9th at barcelona. it was my honeymoon with benjie smith. >> emily's aunt wanted to see europe with her husband and with a few of their friends, and they're from hong kong so they wanted someone who's fluent in english and also in german and italian and some spanish and a little bit of this and that and everything. so she would make a really good guide all over europe. >> and it went like this. hey, benjie, it's really cool, my aunt says she going to pay for our vacation and we'll go on this seven-day cruise ship and then we'll go to paris and it's really cheap because it's free. and then he looked at me. and just looked at me. >> she's the spontaneous half of

our relationship. >> and he said "i need a minute." >> i had to slow down for a minute. i'm a bit more of i have to think things through. after the shot of the spontaneity wore off, i was really excited about the trip, too. >> we decided why don't we make this into our honeymoon trip. >> i got offered the contract two days after i graduated from darts college in london. it was a wonderful life. we got to dance, perform, get applauded by the audience. we got to explore foreign lands. our theater sat 1,500 passengers. this theater to try and understand the scale is about five times the size of a theater on the westnd end in london. to work in a theater that had been custom built with rotating central part of the stage, lifting staircase in the middle of the stage and all these gizmos and gadgets was a real

privilege. >> emily had been on a cruise before and she told me there's always a drill, you go and stand out next to the life boat and you put on your life jackets and everybody practices what would happen in an evacuation scenario. there was a mandatory safety briefing so we went to it. we sat through what was basically a sales presentation and we kept wondering when are they going to get to the safety stuff? but we didn't do any of that. they said, oh, it will be fine, there's a card on the back of your door and there's a booklet in your cabin that tells you all of the safety information. i now the it was unusual, just because i was expecting a drill. when it didn't happen, we shrugged our shoulders and said that's weird but then we went about our business and enjoyed our honeymoon. >> we were told facts about the ship and we had to learn certain details, such as the fire zones, the water zones and what we were expected to do in an emergency situation.

i actually made a point of learning all of these things far beyond actually what any of my colleagues did. i was told that in an emergency i would go to my master station. it's the meeting point for a group that are assigned to either a life boat or a life raft and they're located throughout the ship. the crew members i was responsible for were to come and meet me at that master station, and i would take their teams off a register. and i was actually shocked to discover that i was responsible for anything on the ship. and literally just because i was one of the very few english speakers on board. we prayed nothing ever went wrong. >> but something did go wrong, horribly wrong. they set sail with such high hopes. it was around two and a half hours after pulling out of port, many passengers were having

dinner or drinks in one of the "costa concordia"'s five restaurants and 13 bars. and that's when it happened. coming up -- >> we heard this soft scraping noise. >> chaos. >> wine bottles start to fall off the shelves. >> the entire vessel was shaking violently. it's complete bedlam. >> when "dateline extra" continues. and show some love for the people we love. and the places we love. the stuff we can't get anywhere else and food that tastes like home. because the money we spend here can help keep our town growing. on small business saturday, let's shop small for our neighborhood, our town, our home. on november 26th, get up, (all) get together and shop small. all finished.umm... you wouldn't want your painter to quit part way. i think you missed a spot.

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he wears his army hat, he gets awalks aroundliments. with his army shirt looking all nice.

and then people just say, "thank you for serving our country" and i'm like, that's my dad. male vo: no one deserves a warmer welcome home. that's why we're hiring 10,000 members of the military community by the end of 2017. i'm very proud of him. male vo: comcast. welcome back to "dateline extra." more than 3,200 passengers from every corner of the world were aboard the "costa concordia." there were passengers of all ages, people celebrating anniversaries, birthdays, family reunions. most everyone had a reason to be excited, including a pair of newlyweds. let's return to the "wreck of

the "costa concordia." >> we eloped. got marriaed in the cambridge town hall. >> i now pronounce you husband and wife. >> we had family all over the world so we thought it would be fun if we had a youtube wedding. so we had just two friends come to our wedding. they shot us dancing out in front of some of our favorite spots in boston and cambridge. ♪ ♪ and then we sent that video to all of our family and friends and that was kind of our way of announcing, hey, everybody, get what, we're married. >> and now halfway around the world benjie smith and emily lau were celebrating their honeym n

honeymoon. launching their trip in spain, they'd be crossing the mediterranean for four days and were docking for four days along italy's west coast. of course they couldn't know then what they were about to fates, a struggle to escape and to survive, all of this on january 14th, 2012 as the sun rose on what seemed like a perfect morning. >> we arrived at port and 7:00 in the morning and took the train into rome. so we got to the vatican around 8:00 in the morning and planned the rest of our day. we saw the pantheon and the fountains and we ate lunch at a bakery and we went to the coliseum. so we went all around rome. >> i spent a small amount of time guiding my relatives around. i took them to the vatican and then i said let's meet back here

in three hours. so they went off to do different things and benjie and i just wandered around rome on foot. >> emily had a camera and was taking my picture over and over again. she said, you just look really good in this afternoon light. this was toward the end of the day, around 4:00. and the evening light is getting really nice. >> we got back on the boat, we were so very tired. so we decided that we should go straight to dinner. we did not even have any wine because we were just so tired. >> i love to travel. steve doesn't particularly like to travel. but cruising was the one thing that we enjoyed doing together. >> we were in rome for two days before, and we'd been in rome 30 years previously for our anniversary. we got some souvenirs from the vatican. that's what we need and we're good. we took a train ride from rome to the boat. >> he actually looked at me, he

said to me do i need to put on a suit jacket? and i said, oh, no, no, it's just casual tonight. first night, we'll just go to dinner. so he went to dinner in a short sleeved shirt, his jeans and crocks. no suit jacket, which really could have came in handy had we have known. >> that night we barely got on the boat because we got back late from rome. so we went straight to dinner. after dinner we had made plans to go to a show and then go dancing afterwards. >> my job when not performing was to have photographs taken with passengers. and this is where we dress in our carnival outfits, which is very decorative, brazilian style outfits, and we would walk around the lounges and any of the passengers who had seen us in the shows would ask us for photos with them. so we'd have a photographer and we'd stop and chat with them a

while and have a photograph taken for them. so i had done one hour of my duty, and i had an hour break. so i was up in passenger area wearing a cocktail dress, very glamorous with stilettos on. i had one more hour of photographs to go and i was feeling a little bit tired so i went to the bar with two of my friends to have a coffee before i had to go back to work. >> i was feeling a little feverish. we had had a long, long day in rome. and after dinner i went back to the cabin to do some reading and just relax. >> when i got back to the state room, benjie was reading a book quietly. so i joined him. i took out the camera and we look at all of the photos we took that day in rome. we were just giggling and laughing about how silly we looked and how much fun we had. it was a really nice, quiet, intimate moment. >> we had been looking through these pictures and we did that

for about ten minutes, and then we heard this soft scraping noise from toward the back of the ship. >> and then he looked at me and goes "that's not right." as we said that, the light flickered on and off, wine bottles start to fall off the shelves. >> i was talking with my friends when suddenly i was thrown back in my seat. the coffee spilled over the edge and into the saucer, and then it was like an earthquake. the entire vessel was shaking violently. and there was 30 seconds of just this violent shaking and this loud deafening sound. >> when it first happened, i remember saying that it's not a party till something spills because the waiter had dropped his tray.

>> a certain spot where everything in the room flew. >> we knew right away certainly was wrong. >> the passengers were all upright and looking at us as crew members and what our reaction was. so i jumped over the back of the seat and i peeled away the blind from the window and directly behind the window was land. so my immediate reaction was we've hit land, we are going to sink. and i decided that overreacting was better than underreacting. so i looked at the two dancers and i said we should go back to our cabins, we should get changed and get our life jackets. and my plan was to go down three decks in order to take the corridor to our cabin at the very front of the ship. i stepped out on to the outer deck of the ship. i whipped off my stilettos because i was still in a

cocktail dress and heels and i began a very steady pace running down the length of the ship. there was like a swarm of people. they were running into each other, they were running into walls. some of them were just jumping over the banister. it was complete bedlam. and so i decided that other people were dangerous. >> and there would be more danger ahead. the boat had taken a jolt and passengers were looking to the staff for information about what was going on aboard the "costa concordia." nobody seemed short of much and panic was starting to set in. coming up -- >> the ship kept leaning further and further to one side. >> tilting toward disaster. >> now there's conflict, there's confusion. what's really happening? and why won't they tell us? >> when "dateline extra" continues.

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welcome back to "dateline extra." i'm tamron hall.

the "costa concordia" pulled out from a port 50 miles outside rome at 7:50 p.m. local time. the ship was heading northwest when aren't 9 p.m. the captain told him to steer the ship close to the isle of giglio as a salute. the ship struck rock, immediate immediately began taking on water and started to tilt. we continue with the rest our stories, "the wreck of the "costa concordia." >> at this point we're hearing there's nothing gone wrong, there's nothing to be afraid of, that it's an electrical fault that will be fixed soon. when i heard the announcement that it was an electrical fault,

i thought that was a panic control method and that we were sinking. >> everything tilted to one side. and when the lights went back on, i looked for steve. he was fine. he was kind of pinned between tables, but there was an old man and woman that didn't look like they were anybody with them. so i ran over to them and i just had them hang on to the rail. >> announcer: please remain calm and we'll keep you informed as we have more news to inform you. thank you for your attention. >> all of us knew that there was something terribly wrong because the boat had already been listing. and we all decided we're not going back to our rooms, we're going to a life boat right away. we hadn't gone through any emergency drills, so we didn't know which muster station was where we were supposed to go. we hadn't acclimated ourselves to the ship at all. we didn't even know where our room was. we hardly knew where the restaurant was or what floor we

were on or anything. we just ran outside to find the nearest life boat. >> and as we proceeded out toward the exit sign, there was one staff member we had to ask to get out of the way because he was in shock, he didn't respond to us. then we proceeded out to the life boat at that time. >> there were people from other cabins that were standing outside. the person that takes care of your room was coming around advising everyone that it was an electrical problem, to go back in your problem and everything will be okay. by 10:30 in the evening, i went into the room and i went out into the balcony and that's when i noticed that we were very close to land, about 700 to 1,000 yards. very close. at that point i started thinking this is not an electrical

problem. there's something else, that somehow, some way we're not being told. we started hearing messages in italian. i was having a hard time understanding. i'm fluent in spanish and english but not italian. and i was not able to make any sense of what was being said. >> the ship kept leaning further and further to one side, and we started talking about how could this really be an electrical fault? what's really happening and why won't they tell us? when we first came out of the cabin, the ship was tilting enough that we could feel our center of gravity just off a little bit. it wasn't too difficult to walk

yet, but we had to pay careful attention. it was like stepping on a crooked sidewalk tile. and the people in the hallway were running back and forth shouting in italian and french and german and that helped contribute to the chaos and confusion. by the end of the night, the only way we could walk down any of the corridors was in a corner like this because the ship had tilted over so far. so even just moving a short distance down the hall was really hard to do. >> at some point they announced that everything is not only okay and also we should go back to our cabin. and i was just wearing a really thin jacket in this january weather. i thought maybe it's a good idea for me to run back to the room, get my down jacket. so we were making our way back to our state room, and on the way back we were stopped by another crew member who said you are not allowed to go back to your room. >> now there's conflict.

there's confusion. we're hearing different things from different people. >> i suddenly realized that perhaps the crew members have no idea what's going on either. >> i was actually talking with one of my friend who was becoming a little panicky, so i actually pulled her aside and actually pushed her into a room on her own and i held her shoulders and actually shook her and i said "we are sinking, you're going to need to swim." >> confusion was leading to chaos. passengers weren't getting information from the officers, but the ship was telling them they needed to save themselves. coming up, frantic calls to shore but not from the ship, from the passengers. and -- >> there were grown people that were pushing kids. >> i knew that that was a death trap. >> i decided that i needed to get into action.

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hi, richard lui with your hour's top stories. protesters gathering outside trump towers here in manhattan, the fourth day of demonstrations around the country following the election of donald trump. meanwhile adviser kellyanne conway saying a decision on his chief of staff is imminent. and hillary clinton saying she's heart broken in a conference call with top donors and is also blaming the letters sent by fbi director james comey for halting her momentum in the final days. now back to "dateline extra." welcome back to "dateline extra". i'm tamron hall. more than 4,000 people were aboard the "costa concordia," and it had a hole the size of an olympic swimming pool in its port side. sea water was pouring in and the ship had begun to tilt. two out of seven compartments

all designed to be water tight were flooded. if just one more compartment was breached, the ship would sink to the bottom of the sea. but even at that stage of disaster, passengers had no idea what had happened or what they were supposed to do. we return now to our story, "the wreck of the "costa concordia." >> after we attempted to go back to our room in vein, we crossed over to the restaurant thinking that was a good way to across to the other side to look for my relatives because i don't know where they are. my fear was my relatives, who mostly spoke chinese, didn't know what was going on. ten steps into the restaurant, benjie and i looked at each other and we thought this was a bad idea. >> the tables had turned over, there was broken glass, there were knives, forks all over the floor, wine and water had

spilled everywhere. there was food on the floor, it was slippery. >> there were people just sitting on the side crying. and i knew that that was a death trap. so at that moment i looked at benjie and said let's get out of here as fast as we can. and so we did. we ran and we ran out of the other side of the restaurant. >> and while we were in the restaurant figuring out whether we could climb down to our cabin again, the ship pivoted so that when we came out on the other side, we were facing open water. so as far as we knew, we were out in the middle of the sea. and we could feel the ship sinking and sinking and sinking. >> translator: the night of the accident with the concordia ship, we did not have the classic help message or may day. in reality the passengers had begun to call phones on land.

when we found out about this at the central operating center, we immediately called the concordia, asking the captain how this happened. >> good evening, "costa concordia," do you have problems on board? >> affirmative. we have a blackout on board. we are checking the situation. >> the information that they provided was so vague that it left out amongst anyone who has experience with the sea. the operating center immediately triggered rescue vessel, knowing at that point that we were dealing with a cruise ship with 4,229 people on board, many patrol boats were sent from all over italy. >> we decided let's grab our life jackets. let's go down to where the boats are and maybe there's something that's being arranged to let people know. once we got to where the boats were, that's when we saw the

massive amount of people that were running around, screaming, looking for their relatives. people react differently when they're afraid. there were grown people that were pushing kids, old people that they're not as active or -- and they were pushing them out of the way. some people could have been pushed over the side. i mean, it was that chaotic. >> i decided that i needed to get into action. so i went to my muster station, which is master station 17 on deck for the front of the ship on the bow and when i got there, there was absolutely no one else there. again, this was kind of that feeling that maybe i was overreacting. but i absolutely did not believe that. we have messages on board that are coded, and they're only intended for the professionals

that they're aimed at, and that's to avoid panic. one of the messages i heard was for the doctor to be sent to the milan restaurant. and it sounded like there were two passengers who were injured, probably from the impact. and i also heard a coded message for engineers to go to the engine room. and i also heard a coded message which said that we have flooding. and at this point my superior walked past me and she said, "your job is to entertain the passengers so go back to your cabin and put on your costume and go back to the lounge and entertain people." so i told her that i was not going to be going back to the lounge and that i was keeping my life jacket on. how you can tell someone's going to a dangerous situation i cannot comprehend. passengers were actually congregating on the outer deck of the ship in front of life

boats, and they weren't told to do that but they were doing that of their own accord. and i actually saw the assistant cruise director walking towards them. she was telling them to take their life jackets off and go back to their cabins and wait for more information. unbelievable. and at that point i just completely ignored her, and she started shouting at me and i put my back to her because i considered myself no longer working for the company. >> some passengers, crew and staff felt like they were on their own, but officers were in touch with the italian coast guard. would order be restored? and was help on the way? coming up, a rush to the life boats. >> we got to get off the ship. >> someone screamed out "women and children first." >> up to this point we were together. now she's on a life boat and i'm still on a sinking ship.

>> when "dateline extra" continues.

welcome back to "dateline extra." i'm tamron hall. some 45 minutes after the "costa concordia" the luxury liner had been transformed into an increasingly dangerous obstacle course. passengers decided they weren't waiting for an evacuation order. the ship's life boats were all located on deck four. passengers realized they were going to have to do whatever it took to get to those boats. we continue with the "wreck of the "costa concordia.""

>> we knew something was seriously wrong with that boat. >> there was chaos and screaming. people were running all over the place. we settled at the nearest life boat that we could with our american friends. >> it seemed like it made sense to get people off the boat as soon as possible. since we didn't see anybody's staff, we put everybody's life jackets on and we thought we would open up the life boats so we would help people get in the boat at that time. that's when the staff member showed up out of know where, told us to take our life jackets off and closed everything up. >> he came up and say there's no fr problem, go back to your room, go back to your room. we wouldn't go. there was already a group of people already around this life boat knowing that we got to get off the ship.

>> it was very cold. the wind was blowing. it was dark. the water's there, the boat is tilting. everything is fraying apart. i was getting worried. people are pushing toward the life boat. they're moving slowly but surely but they're moving into the boat. the people from the crew couldn't hold them back anymore. then everybody was on their own. >> the next step after we got out of the restaurant was the other side of the boat, at this point the high side of the boat. we thought maybe this is time to get in line for life boat because everyone was in line for life boat. and we saw that every single life boat had a full line. so we just picked one and we were at the very end of the line. >> people were pushing shoulder to shoulder. they'd school their feet in front of your feet by just a little bit, wedging themselves in and then having got i don't

know -- gotten their feet in place, they'd scoot their shoulders in a little bit and casually push themselves in front of you. >> and i looked at benjie and i said, hey, benjie, i don't want to push but you know if we don't push, we will be at the very end of the line and that we might not get on the life boat and that we might die, right? >> at about this time we started to hear announcements, first in italian. i remember hearing the word "abundanar ilbarko." i don't speak italian but i caught on to that word that must

mean abandon. that's it abandon ship, abandonship. and someone screamed women and children first. and i burst on to the life boat. i remember getting into the boat and on my right and left were two grief stricken women. they were trying uncontrollably. they were all screaming and crying for their husband. so i put my arms around them and i used my very limited german and my very limited spanish and told them that everything is okay. and i kept looking at the entrance of the life boat hoping that i would see benjie's face. >> i kissed emily and i said as soon as all the women and children are on there, i'm going to follow you on to that life boat, but she boarded the life boat and some of the men didn't follow the convention, they pushed their way up, and by the time i was at the front of the line, the woman manning our

muster station said that the life boat was full. >> i was too scared to be scared. i was too scared to think about how scared i was. because the next step is to think i'm going to die, he's going to die, we're going to be left behind, we won't see each other again. >> this was a big moment for me because up to this point, we were together, we were a team, but now she's on a life boat and i'm still on a sinking ship. >> newlyweds married just two weeks were separated and facing the possibility of death and a couple married for 30 years tried to make peace with saying good-bye to the life they'd built together. coming up, into the life boats but not out of danger. >> we thought that boat was going to literally land on top of us. >> i said, please, just get in touch with our kids and tell

them we love them and tell them good-bye. >> when "dateline extra" continues. seem knowledgeable, professional. would you trust me as your financial advisor? -i would. -i would indeed. well, let's be clear, here. i'm actually a deejay. ♪ [ laughing ] no way! i have no financial experience at all. that really is you? if they're not a cfp pro, you just don't know. find a certified financial planner professional who's thoroughly vetted at letsmakeaplan.org. cfp. work with the highest standard.

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can help prepare you for growth at open.com. find he wears his army hat, ehe gets awalks aroundliments. with his army shirt looking all nice. and then people just say, "thank you for serving our country" and i'm like, that's my dad. male vo: no one deserves a warmer welcome home. that's why we're hiring 10,000 members of the military community by the end of 2017. i'm very proud of him.

male vo: comcast. welcome back to "dateline extra." it had been more than an hour since the "costa concordia" started taking on water, and with little help from the ship's officers, many passengers were frantically plotting the best way off the sinking ship on their own. some made it to life boats and for others, it looked like the only way they were going to make it was to jump into the water and swim for it. we continue with "the wreck of the "costa concordia." >> i took the people that were with me, which was my companion and there was another lady and her daughter and we headed towards the boats that were

being loaded by chaotic people. everything was crazy, people screaming all over the place. nobody knew what to do. there was a lot of confusion going on. the lady that i was with did not know how to swim. and also i was told that the lady and her daughter that was with me, that they didn't know how to swim. i had to develop a plan to get us off this boat quickly. i told them you have to do what i tell you. if we need to jump off this ship, we'll jump off, and we will form a chain and i will drag you into the rocks and we will get off this boat. the water where we were, it might have been 50 to 75 feet in height. i do triathlons, mainly iron man

races. so that experience led me to believe that i could swim, you know, 700 yards with three people, dragging them. i could tell that they were in shock, they were afraid, and i kept letting them know that everything is going to be all right. relax and listen to what i'm telling you. and they didn't say anything. they just -- they had their eyes glued on me. >> about an hour after the boat hit, there was an overhead announcement abandon ship. and the people that had been waiting here now started clamoring to get on the boat, so we opened up the gate and just to do that was a big deal because all these people wand o wanted to get in so they were clamoring around this gate. the other american and i hold

back this gate so the little kids wouldn't get trampled. >> people were screaming, people weri were crying. we were literally pushed into this life boat. once we got into the life boat, it was crowded with so many people that the crew had a hard time disengaging. >> there was no crew at the time. when the staff did show up, they started getting ready to drop it to the water. there was well over twice as many people as it should be. >> i kept saying who is in charge? who is counting? and there were clearly in just our little area on a few benches that we were near, i stopped counting at 50. >> the capacity was 130 and it was well over 200, probably 260, probably twice as many. but the staff didn't take any interest in helping people on the boat. >> but then it occurred to me that, i mean, who are you going to exclude?

so that's why i shut up. who's to say that they can't come on the boat? i mean, of course we wanted everybody on that boat. everybody needed to get off the ship. >> so we hit a lever and the boat came away from the ship and just fell because there was so much weight in it. we didn't think the boat would hold but it dropped abruptly. >> there was a free fall. >> so that's the time when we thought that we might not make it at that time. >> we started to come down unevenly. not only coming down unevenly, but we were bouncing against the ship. we all thought -- i thought that we were going to go into the water. people were getting even more frantic but luckily we were able to land in the water flatly,

except at this point in time we see that there's another boat that is coming in above us. that created more tension because we thought at that point in time that that boat was going to literally land on top of us. >> luckily the engine started and we were able to pull away. >> i decided i needed to be at my muster station because the ship was inclining to the right-hand side. after i had taken the register or the roll call of my crew members, i was supposed to be relieved by my superior. however, my superior was an engineer, and he had just come up from the engine room. he was waist deep in water, and he was the last person to get out of the engine room before they shut the doors and sealed it. so when he made his way to supposedly relieve me, he was

not in any fit state to do that job. he had nearly lost his life at this point. i tried to give him the register and he wouldn't take it. so at this point i was kind of promoted, and i suddenly became chief of roll call. so i had to take charge of all of these people and their lives were in my hands. >> we left without our phones, without our camera, without any i.d. and i had talked to my children, our children, and that was the saddest and the scariest part was that i -- i thought maybe this might be our demise and i hadn't said good-bye to my kids. >> one of the other americans said that they had a phone because i said, god, everything's gone. here, he said you can borrow my

phone. >> most of us have cell phones with our kids on our contact lists, their phone numbers hadn't been memorized. i didn't know who to call so i called a girl friend i had for 30 years and her husband answered the phone and i said, vernon, we are on a life boat and i don't know if we're going to make it and i said could you just say good-bye to our kids? and he said you're what? you're where? i said just listen to be me, we are in italy, on a life boat being taken off a ship because it looks like we are going to sink. i said, please, just get in touch with our kids and tell them we love them and tell them good-bye. that was the most horrifying part. >> there would be more gut-wrenching decisions ahead. a terrifying ride on a life boat

for some and for others still on the ship, each choice may have meant life or death. coming up, a crew in crisis. >> the passengers got their evacuation notice but the crew did not and they began to panic and they were crushing one another. >> the couple left behind. >> that was a grim, grim moment. all the life boats are gone. now what do we do? >> when "dateline extra" continues. because, healthier doesn't happen all by itself. it needs to be earned every day. using wellness to keep away illness. and believing a single life can be made better by millions of others. as a health services and innovation company optum powers modern healthcare by connecting every part of it. so while the world keeps searching for healthier we're here to make healthier happen. daddy! lets play! sorry kids. feeling dead on your feet? i've been on my feet all day.

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