There's plenty of coverage this week for the extraordinary salvage operation underway off the coast of Italy.

The cruise liner the Costa Concordia famously ploughed into rocks off the tiny island of Giglio in January last year. And until early yesterday it remained lying on its side there, half-submerged, appearing both powerful and vulnerable at the same time.

The ambition of the rescue operation is impressive. You’re talking about hauling up a ship which is twice the size of the Titanic.

It makes a great story. As indeed did the ship’s crash back in 2011 with its key character, the skipper Francesco Schettino, who mysteriously found himself on a lifeboat before some of his passengers – a major no-no in the Big Book of Noble Captaining.

But I do wonder, while we’re gasping at the sight of some massive cables, if we’re thinking of the Costa Concordia first and foremost as a great story, rather than a great tragedy.

It seems almost forgotten now that 32 people died when the cruise liner hit the rocks two years ago.

For a bit of context, that’s more than were killed in the fire at King’s Cross Tube Station in 1987.

Indeed two of the dead from the Costa Concordia have never been found – hopefully their bodies will be recovered as part of this week’s salvage operation.

Dragging the massive cruise liner back onto its keel creates some wonderful pictures and it’s also a chance to revisit an extraordinary story.

But we shouldn’t forget that the great ship being hauled off the rocks this week is not just the centrepiece of a newsworthy drama, it is also a morgue.