Teams of naval officers, firefighters and coastguards said the air inside the ship, which capsized off an Italian island, was 'unbreathable'.
Fire chief Enio Aquilino said: 'Imagine the scene if you went on holiday and you came back to find the fridge had switched itself off. The divers are working in those conditions.’
The grim conditions inside the vessel were revealed as two more bodies were recovered from the Costa Concordia today, bringing the confirmed death toll to 15.
The two women were found in a submerged section of the ship, in the internet cafe and were located after further holes had been blown into the superstructure of the Concordia by navy divers.
Tonight it emerged that one of the bodies found was that of Italian honeymooner Maria D'Introno, 30, who was on the cruise with her new husband Vincenzo Roselli and her in-laws, who were celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary.
Maria, who could not swim, was thought to have jumped in the water with Vincenzo but tonight family friend Carlo Cabrio said: 'They were holding hands when they jumped in but we now think she climbed back up the rope ladder. She was terrified of the water.'
News of the discovery was broken minutes after Franco Gabrielli, the commissioner in charge of the rescue effort focusing on the 114,000-ton super liner, said that the ship was stable and there was no danger of it slipping from the rock shelf it is balanced on.
It means the search continue alongside efforts to siphon off 500,000 gallons of fuel.
Searching has stopped several times since the disaster on 13 January after movement was detected by state of lasers pointed onto the ship from boats anchored close by.
Mr Gabrielli also added that there was no need to secure the Concordia where navy, coastguard and firefighting diving teams are searching for the bodies of at least ‘24 or 25 people’.
This appears to confirm an earlier line of inquiry that some of the missing passengers may not have been registered. Among them was a woman, thought to be Hungarian, who was found yesterday.
Until last night, there had been 19 people officially unaccounted for.
But with the two bodies discovered this morning - reducing that figure to 17 - it means as many eight victims may have been unregistered passengers.
Speaking at a press conference on the island of Giglio he said: 'Having spoken with a team of experts the search and the removal of the fuel can proceed at the same time.
‘The search will continue as long as possible and if there are bodies between the ship and the bottom of the sea these will recovered when the ship is straightened.’
Mr Gabrielli said that he had also asked Costa Cruises about the possibility of salvaging the Concordia which is lying on a rock shelf just outside the part of Giglio where it came to rest after hitting rocks ten days ago two hours after leaving port on a week long Mediterranean cruise.
Costa have not said yet what exactly will happen to the Concordia but salvage experts say the most likely outcome is that it will be cut into huge sections and taken away for scrap - that and the fuel removal operation are expected to last at least three months.
There were fears that the Concordia's double-bottom fuel tanks could rupture in case of sudden shifting, spilling 2,200 tonnes of heavy fuel into pristine sea around Giglio.
The island is part of an archipelago in some of the Mediterranean's clearest waters and a prized fishing area.
The search had been halted for several hours yesterday, after instrument readings indicated that the Concordia had shifted on its precarious perch on a seabed just outside Giglio's port.
A few yards away, the sea bottom drops off suddenly, by some 65-100 feet, and if the Concordia should abruptly roll off its ledge, rescuers could be trapped inside.
When instrument data indicated the vessel had stabilised again, rescuers returned, but explored only the above-water section and evacuation staging areas where survivors indicated that people who did not make it into lifeboats during the chaotic evacuation could have remained.
Authorities are also trying to identify five corpses which are badly decomposed after spending a long time in the water.
Mr Gabrielli said the other eight bodies: four French, an Italian, a Hungarian, a German and a Spanish national, had been identified .
The missing include French passengers, an elderly couple from Minnesota, a Peruvian crew member and an Indian crewman and an Italian father and his five-year-old daughter.
Some of their relatives toured the wreckage yesterday and also met Pierluigi Foschi chief executive of Costa Crociere, the ship's operator, who viewed the crippled cruise liner from a boat.
France's ambassador to Italy, Alain Le Roy, recounting Mr Foschi's visit, said: "He came to see the families, all families. He met the French family. He met the American family.
'I am sure he is meeting other families, mostly to express his compassion ... to say that Costa will do everything possible to find the people, to compensate families in any way.’
Passengers were dining at a gala supper when the Concordia sailed close to Giglio and struck the reef, which is indicated on maritime and even tourist maps.
The liner's Italian captain, Francesco Schettino, is under house arrest as prosecutors investigate him for suspected manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning the ship while many were still aboard.
Costa Crociere, a subsidiary of US-based Carnival Cruise Lines, has said Schettino had deviated without permission from the vessel's route in an apparent manoeuvre to sail close to the island and impress passengers.
Firefighters hang scuba gear out a chopper as they prepare to descend to the Costa Concordia
Schettino, despite audiotapes of his defying coastguard orders to scramble back aboard, has denied he abandoned ship while hundreds of passengers were desperately trying to get off the capsizing vessel.
The 52-year-old has said he co-ordinated the rescue from aboard a lifeboat and then from the shore.
He claims he sailed his ship too close to the coast because he was asked to do so by his bosses.
Francesco Schettino said the ‘sail by salute’ was ‘arranged and wanted’ by Costa Cruises chiefs for publicity reasons, according to details of his police questioning leaked to the Italian media.
By NICK PISA
Last updated at 10:04 PM on 23rd January 2012
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2090664/Costa-Concordia-death-toll-rises-15-divers-reveal-unbreathable-air-search.html#ixzz1kKHN83ti
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