should never have been where it was in the first place, should never have tipped over the way it did. commanded by a captain who according to authorities should never have done what he did before, during or after his ship first ran into trouble. the questions are many tonight. we begin with a moment by moment account of what we now know. >> around 9:30 at night, the lights go out president a this point, there doesn't seem to be much panic among the passengers. but some sense that there was something more serious than just a power blackout. >> they were saying everything is under control. there was an electrical problem. we looked at each other and said they're full of it. we have to get off the boat. >> in fact, the sky scraper-sized smip ran into rocks and was beginning to list to one side. now passengers begin to panic. [ screaming ] >> reporter: this amateur video shows the dark cold chaos as passengers try to flee the ship in life jackets. battling against gravity to get out. according to the accounts of survivors, some of the crew members helped passengers board lifeboats before jumping overboard. other crew members seemed helpless and confused. >> people were pushing and shoving. there was no order. there were no lines, there was no system in place and there was no charge. >> because of the tilting ship, some passengers are unable to make it to the lifeboats. some decide to jump and swim for shore, risking injury and hypothermia with air temperatures dipping below freezing. >> hit the cold water. when it gets wet, it starts to flash. i could just see flashing lites. some were freaking out, grabbing hold of people. everyone was just trying to keep everyone calm calm. >> at about 10:20 p.m., rescue operations begin from shore. divers search in pitch blackness for survivors. at dawn, the enormity of the damage is clear. an open gash running the length of the six. by monday, at least six people are dead and more than two dozen remain missing. then the partially sunken vessel begins to shift, temporarily halting rescue operations. this picture says it all about how precarious, dangerous and difficult this search and rescue operation is proving to be. earlier on, officers had to be winched off the superstructure of the costa concordia as she started shifting at sea. now they're beginning operations of the 2,000 cabins inside. meanwhile, the chief executive has defended the actions of the crew following this disaster, but says the captain's actions probably contributed to this wreck. the ship's captain was arrested and may face charges of manslaughter and abandoning ship while passengers were still onboard. some passengers recorded seeing him board a lifeboat before they were able to evacuate. he could face up to 15 years in prison. on italian television, he said he and his crew were the last to leave the ship and that the rocks they hit were not marked on his map. still, why he took this massive ship so close to the rocky shore is unclear. an investigation is under way while concern grows over the face of the missing, and resc r rescuers say could still be trapped in the ship's partially flooded compartments. >> and dan joins us now with more. you went out and got a look at the rocky shoreline. whoever was at the helm of the ship, how would they not realize the hazards were there. they had made this trip, this route an awful lot, hadn't they? >> they had. and perhaps that contributed to the complacency of the captain. they had a habit of going very, very close to the port, showboating, effectively, to show off to their friends on the island, apparently. this time they got very close, too close, scraping that huge hole along the hull. we went out there. i mean, frankly, you would have to be mad to take a ship that size that close to the shore. it's very close indeed. i just can't really imagine what they were thinking. there wow been alarms going on on the bridge and screens on their navigation screens, telling them to bear away, but they didn't. >> do we know how deep the water is there, dan? >> well, it's more than 100 meters if you stay outside the rocks. but there is a reef there that k078s out from a peninsula. we were out there in an inflatable boat. you can see the rocks. it's not very deep at all. and as i say, you know, there's a huge thunk of rock embedded in the held of the ship. that gives you an idea of the force with which it hit those rocks. it ripped a piece of rock off the size of the car, which is stuck in the hull. >> from what you know of these situation, is it likely at this point that this is just more of a recofferry effort than really a rescue effort? or could there still be people inside the ship above the water somewhere? >> there could still be people locked into compartments when the ship is twisted and moved, like a house, when you get a big rainstorm you can't open your door or close yor door. they could still be trapped in a compartment where they can't physically move because of the twisting of the metal. >> also it's important to talk about, it looks like a pretty calm environment. it's not particularly deep, but for the divers, they have got to go through this wreck, do i having in a wreck at anytime is dangerous. this boat is still possibly moving, could still move. it's very dangerous for the divers look iing for people who might be under the water or alive in the boat. >> yes, it certainly is. one, as you point out nicely, the boat is still going to move because the tide is moving so it has to move. but on top of that, if you think inside the ship, all the electrical systems gone, the water moving around, the initial few hundred feet minimum going in, there's no advise ability. so these divers aren't going into a facility where they're able to physically see anything. they have to run tracer lines. it's a line that starts to the outside of the ship. when they move forward they'll bring the line with them so they can get themselves back out. there could be a point where they're going to make certain turn, whether it's a companion way or going down into another lowered deck, they may put another diver at the top of those stairs to take care of the diver that's now going down and trying to find his way to another compartment. >> it's a dangerous and slow process. dan, it looked like it was -- i mean, there wasn't a lot of organization, as you said, in your report. did the people onboard know that the ship itself wasn't likely to completely sink? because that's the most terrifying thing, the y idea that the whole thing is going to go underwater. did they have that information? >> i think there was probably one thought in most people's head which is one word -- titanic. and it matched the obvious kind of thought, the image that comes to mind when you look at it, especially when you get up close and just see how big it is. of course, it's 100 years ago since titanic sank in the atlantic. she went down completely. i think the people onboard wouldn't have any idea what was going to happen. it was dark. they couldn't see the shore. all they knew was the boat was going over and they didn't know if it was going to go down as well. >> to go through a ship this size, how many divers would you need. how long would it take? >> this could literally take a coup of weeks because of the pace. until they get to a paint where they can have the sloshing of the water and visibility, most likely they would also be running a camera line back to a main deck so that they can actually see what was happening back on the surface. this this could take 100 divers. >> thanks for being on. for more now on the why of this disaster. let's turn to tom foreman. >> look at this if, the costa concorda held twice as many passengers as the "titanic." everything that's been learned since the "titanic" sinking went into its construction. how did this happen? investigators we believe are focussing on three key questions. let's go through them here. when they hit, the power went off right after impact. that has raised suspicion that there could have been some electrical problem that maybe caused the navigation system to malfunction, or there was an electrical problem that came from that impact that really shouldn't have happened. ships like this are not designed to have that happen. so the second question is why did the ship start tilting so dramatically and so quickly after that impact. ships like this are designed to carry their load, all their heavihe have vi equipment, the engine, all that very low for stability. they have numerous watertight compartments so if water comes into one of them, it can be sealed off. that's supposed to keep it safe when they have such a collision like this. and, in fact, the ship itself is supposed to be the primary vessel for taking people back to safety. instead, this one went into a tight turn in shallow water and then it rolled almost completely on its side, anderson. >> that must have been so scary. there's also criticism about the evacuation itself. we saw how disorganized it was. how long did the captain wait for the evacuation, do we know? >> it sounds like from the accounts, about 45 minutes from the actual impact to the evacuation. that raises the third big question. why was the evacuation apparently so chaotic? we know this cruise had just begun, we are told there were language barriers involved. it was dark. passengers had not been given safety briefings yet. there's that rock mentioned by dan, there it is. many people were celebrating their first night at sea and only been out a while. they were in the restaurants, that sort of thing. many didn't even know the command to abandon ship had been given, yet look what was happening below all these decks, huge, huge ship in the dark. as you go deeper into this hull. here are the top decks, this is roughly where the water is now. as you go through all these decks, look at the amount of deck being devoured by the water gets bigger and bigger, you get to this level with the casino and big theater and a lot of restaurants, you get closer to having everything under water. by the final bottom decks, basically everything is completely under water. as bush mentioned, think about this, 57 degrees is cold enough to bring on confusion and exhaustion of hypothermia and many people, in an hour or even less. so even people onboard, if they were trapped down here and got wet, it made it very difficult for them to think clearly, anderson, and that seems to have added to it. these are the three big questions right now investigators have to be asking before they can move to the more delicate ones. >> 29 unaccounted for at this point. we're on facebook, google plus, add us to your circles and twitter. i'll be tweeting tonight. does this make you less likely to go on one of these kind of cruises? let me know. next, the latest on the campaign trail, new signs mitt romney is on the road to victory and the anti-gingrich ad about his time at bain capital and laid-off workers and weren't laid off by bain, they actually said they got promotions. roo. >> and later, the hunt for one last killer pardoned in mississippi and a search for answers from the one guy who pardoned them. the former governor is saying they committed crimes of passion and therefore they're not a risk. but is that correct? 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[whispering] big dreams. one competitor is dropping out, another is losing momentum, coming under fresh scrutiny for attacking mitt romney. yet another challenger hopes to stop romney with what his campaign is calling a money bomb. and it's a big one. ron paul may have taken the last four days off, but his supporters have been busy. john huntsman is out. he made it official today. >> today, i am suspending my campaign for the presidency. i believe it is time for our party to unite around the candidate best quipped to defeat barack obama. despite our defensives and the space between us on some of the issues. i believe that candidate is governor mitt romney. >> new polling out today from cnn shows governor romney far and away the front-runner among republicans nationwide and newt gingrich and rick santorum won the endorsement of christian conservative leaders over the week. newt gingrich warning conservatives that anyone voting for santorum or himself ensuring himself, meaning a moderate, wins the nomination. >> ask yourself a simple question. why would you want to nominate the guy who lost to the guy who lost to obama? okay? >> today's polling seems to contradict him there. republicans by a 2.4% margin thinks governor romney stands the best chance of beating obama in november. speaker golden globe is no longer using another attack on mitt romney's time at bain capital. maybe because of the reaction he got at the candidate forum saturday. >> governor romney ran saying he created 100,000 jobs in the private sector. let me just say -- >> mr. speaker, we said we would not allow any comments on the other candidates. >> i was answering his question. let me say it differently. i believe it's fair to ask the records be clear. >> the record is not exactly clear thanks in part to that 28 minute documentary style campaign ad by winning our future which is the super pac supporting gingrich. you can question governor romney's time at bain and his claims are hard to back up. he's been toning them down himself. that's not the issue. with this ad, the issue -- it's less about exaggeration and more about out-and-out fraud in this super pac ad. the ad features people who used to work at a company that bain bought in the '90s. watch. >> i never knew if i was going to have a job when i came in the next day. we had insurance there. we both worked there. if we was let go, we both was let go at the same time and neither one of us would have a job. >> then, at the very end, they decided to shut the doors. >> they never -- no matter how much they already had, they just could never get enough money. >> that sounds ominous. but when the "wall street journal" contacted those three workers. they said they were taken out of context. they said they got promotions and raises when bain took over. what were they talking about on the video? bain bought unimac in 1988 but sold it six years later to another private group who closed their plant and moved it to wisconsin. they said they were interviewed by john burke who was uninterested in hearing anything positive and paid them in visa gift cards. "the journal" said when it taca to contacting our future, here's what rick tyler told us. i don't know what their beef is. it was presented in context. they were talking about what bain did as far as cheapening quality of product and moving it along the production line too quickly. that's what mitt romney did, bain drives companies into debt until they have to merge with another company or shut down. with the south carolina primary fast approaching, we have two with us. bill burton is here and rich gaylin, who served as a communications director of newt gingrich when he was house speaker. bill, if criticizing romney on bain is something now seems like republicans are backing off of, it's backfired, at least on gingrich through the super pac, do you think this is something democrats now are not going to want to go to? >> facts matter. what you saw not only has newt gingrich's campaign been a disaster but the super pac is not doing a very good job. there's a very damaging straightforward truth-based argument to be made about private erk kwi equity and the role mitt romney had. >> and what about democrats once this becomes a general election? >> i don't think that happens in this primary is anything that can't be used in the general election. the way newt gingrich and the super pac tried to go at this by not being straightforward who these workers were and what happened to them was damaging to them but i don't think it has anything to do with what will happen in the general. >> in the past several days we started to hear something different from mitt romney and the claims about the jobs. saying he created hundreds of thousands to tens of thousands to thousands in a web ad. if this is this centerpiece of his campaign, is this a big problem? >> it points up he violated one of the principle rules of politics, never get stuck with a hard number you can't defend. about two months or so, i thought the president did the same thing when he said unemployment would likely be or possibly be 8% by november. when i heard that, i thought, why would you say that? just say it's heading in the right direction, we're doing everything we can. i think that's what romney found himself, came up with this 100,000 number that was indefensible so now they're trying to back and fill. >> when you work in private equity not to create jobs but to make a big return for yourself and those who invest in your private equity firm. there's nothing wrong with that. bain wasn't in the creating job business, giving returns to investors business. was it a mistake for romney to paint this as a jobs creator opposed to revenue builder? >> to a degree, i think it is, anderson. this will come back and get him in the general election. most americans have no idea what private equity does, something stereotyped and demagogued by people since the 1980s, the gordon gecko caricature. it's going to be hard for him to explain what he did. how did he create the jobs? were jobs lost and were jobs created? how was he able to make money when he won a deal or lost a deal. >> i'm not sure it's that hard. he points to domino's and staples and sports authority, everybody has one of those nearby and know how many people are employed. dominos. they have big businesses and hire people. i don't think he has to be nibbl every hire and fire. >> and it sets him up to be nibbled around the details, something the democrats can come after him. frankly, it's his biggest strength and they will try to attack it and tear it down and first stuck on numbers and now other details. it will be hard. >> i'm curious how you think of these poll numbers. voters think romney can handle the economy better than president obama. how do you think the economy is doing a bit better but the president's approval numbers have not been improving. >> if you look at economy numbers for mitt romney, my advice is go to the cnn web page, print out this story and put it in a frame. this will be the best it ever gets. this is what the numbers look like before people take a hard look at what his record was. this back and forth whether it was smart to use 100,000 workers or not. the issue for him is he doesn't have a good answer for what he did at bain capital and what that meant for what he could do as president. >> but saying president obama could handle the economy as well as -- >> we're going through a period of time the president has been taking broadside attacks from republicans day after day with basically no response and even show, his numbers have held steady. this is not a terrible place to start the general election. >> we have to leave it there. still ahead, in syria, the monitors are getting ready to wrap up their mission, even as the death toll is rising. what's going to happen in on