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Hero Violonist the 1st Cruise Ship Victim
A Minnesota couple traveling on the Costa Concordia remains missing.
Jan. 18, 2012— -- A Hungarian violinist who helped save young children aboard the ill-fated Costa Concordia was the first victim of the crash to be identified today.
Sandor Feher, 38, was identified by his mother, who confirmed that he was an entertainer on the cruise ship when it went down Friday, Jan. 13, after hitting a reef on the Italian coast.
Feher helped small children on the boat's deck put on life jackets before returning to his cabin to pack his violin, according to the Hungarian newspaper Blikk. Jossef Balog, a pianist on the ship, told the newspaper that Feher was last seen on deck, wearing his life jacket and en route to the lifeboat area.
Fehrer's body, however, was found inside the wreck.
The $250 million ship was carrying more than 4,200 passengers and crew when it crashed, 11 of whom have been found dead and 21 of whom are still missing.
Earlier today, Gertrud Goergens, a German woman who was listed among the missing, was located alive and well in Germany. She identified herself to police there.
Jerry and Barbara Heil, a couple from Minnesota on the cruise, still have not been found, according to a statement released by their children today.
The couple's White Bear Lake, Minn., church, where they were actively involved, will hold a prayer service tonight at 7 p.m. for the couple. Church leaders said they expect more than 1,500 people to attend.
The search by the Italian Coast Guard for the remaining individuals was suspended today after the boat shifted on the ocean floor.
"As a precautionary measure, we stopped the operations this morning in order to verify the data we retrieved from our detectors and understand if there actually was a movement, and if there has been one, how big this was," Coast Guard Cmdr. Filippo Marini told The Associated Press.
Costa Cruises, the company that owned the ship, announced today that it has assembled a team of salvage experts from around the world to help recover the ship's fuel reserves to prevent leaks into the ocean.
The company expected the fuel salvage to be completed by the end of the week.
It cannot remove the fuel until all rescue efforts are complete, however, because the ship could shift again once the fuel is removed, making it impossible to find any remaining bodies.
It was unclear when divers would be able to resume their search of the partially submerged cruise liner.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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