Infrared footage of Costa Concordia passengers clambering down to lifeboats in the dark on a single safety rope

An incredible infrared footage has emerged today showing survivors of Costa Concordia slipping down the belly of the stricken cruise ship one-by-one using a rope.

The black-and-white video, taken by the Italian Coastguard, shows passengers queueing up to get into lifeboats.

The film has been released after a French survivor today claimed that panicking crew were already “fleeing in their life jackets” before passengers were warned the cruise liner was sinking.

Pensioner Daniele Perruchon, 68, also said men shoved past children screaming “I don’t want to die” as they raced to save themselves aboard the sinking ship.

Daniele Perruchon was travelling with an elderly friend celebrating her 80th birthday when the chaos erupted on Friday night.

The woman said they were abandoned in the darkness as the giant ship listed after striking rocks off Italian island of Giglio.

She and her friend were having dinner when the lights went out and crockery began crashing around them, she told French newspaper Nice-Matin.

Daniele Perruchon said: “At that point a loud speaker announcement in Italian said <<The electrical circuit of the stabilizers has cut out. This is not a problem>>.

“Then as we were waiting in the gloom we saw terrified staff dashing past us in their life jackets. People were shouting and pushing each other.

“I was with an elderly person and determined not to panic. We made it back to our cabin and got our life jackets, then managed to reach one of the decks.

“Then we felt the ship begin tipping over. There was mass panic. The ship was at a steep angle and people were trying to reach the life boats by clinging to the walls.

“A woman fell on me and we went crashing into a telephone cabin. We managed to get into a life boat but it was unable to launch, and we were eventually taken off it by the Italian coastguard.

“At no time did anyone come and help us. We felt abandoned. So much for women and children first.

“I heard children crying out <<I don’t want to die>> as men pushed past trying to get themselves off the boat.”

Daniele Perruchon, from the French Riviera resort of Menton, said the cruise had been meant as a “dream holiday” for her and her elderly friend.

She said: “We have decided the first thing we are going to do is get straight back on another cruise liner to beat the fear.”

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