It was the middle of a hard day's night when the wreck of the Costa Concordia was finally righted.

The operation that started yesterday morning off the Italian of Giglio came to a successful conclusion early today.

Relieved salvage workers got a heroes' welcome from residents on the island.

"We had a plan that we thought would come together and it did. We needed a bit of luck with the weather, we had some bad weather before we started and we got some bad weather coming tomorrow but in-between you plan, you prepare and you get lucky," one of the salvors said.  (See video of the salvage operation above) 

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