See haunting photos of salvaged Costa Concordia

This was the Costa Concordia.

In 2012, the Italian luxury cruise liner struck some rocks off the coast of Tuscany, causing the ship to capsize. The unfortunate event left 32 passengers dead which resulted in the captain, Francesco Schettino, being found guilty and sentenced to 16 years in jail for abandoning the ship while it sank.

Two years later in 2014, the ship was finally towed to the port city of Genoa where it was scrapped for salvage. It was the most expensive maritime wreck recovery of all time, amounting to roughly 1.7 billion dollars.

After the ship was successfully towed to shore, Germany-based photographer Jonathan Danko Kielkowski swam out and climbed aboard the vessel to capture photographs of the wreckage for his forthcoming book, “Concordia”.

Witness the devastation…