13 BRIAN PAGE

Passenger As tables overturned and plates and glasses crashed to the floor in the Roma restaurant (pictured right), Brian Page, a retired accountant recovering from chemotherapy treatment for cancer, was struck on the head by a box of candles flying through the air.

It started a night of chaos and terror, culminating in him sliding across the heavily listing deck to reach the safety of a lifeboat.

After the initial collision with reefs, Mr Page and his fellow diners moved to the bar, where they sat for more than an hour.

Mr Page, 63, a divorcee from Southampton, said: “Over the tannoy, there was an announcement not to panic and that everything was under control. We just sat talking quite casually. Then the alarm did go and the announcement came to abandon ship.”

With neither a life jacket nor his medication, Mr Page returned to his cabin, number 2381, on Deck 2. “The emergency lights were on, it was very steep, but I was managing to walk reasonably well,” he said. “The cabin was in complete darkness and I was scrambling around trying to get hold of my medicine, my rucksack to put it in and my life jacket.”

Mr Page made his way to a muster station on Deck 3 – close to the funnel on the side which was starting to tip skywards – only to find that all the lifeboats were packed.

The people gathered on deck were told to make their way to the back of the ship to see if there were any lifeboats available. But not only were these full, they were impossible to launch because one side of the Concordia was by now high in the air. Mr Page climbed a deck and made his way towards the back of the ship, passing at least five other muster stations.

He reached the highest point of the liner and was clinging on to the rails to stop himself falling as it continued to list and the incline got steeper and steeper.

“I was holding on the railings for dear life,” he said.

An announcement instructed people to move to the other side, which was closer to the water, and from where lifeboats were still being launched. Mr Page was one of the first to let go and slide across the boat, through the Milano restaurant, before crashing into railings. He then managed to squeeze through them, dropping himself four feet into a lifeboat.

“Behind us people were getting pushed and crushed against the railings, there were people with broken fingers,” he said. The lifeboat was released and, shortly after, Mr Page finally reached the safety of the shore.