Salvage workers yesterday began pumping fuel from the shipwrecked cruise liner Costa Concordia, a day ahead of schedule, officials said.

Unregistered passengers might have been aboard the stricken cruise liner that capsized off a Tuscan island, raising the possibility that the number of missing might be higher than previously announced.

The captain who grounded the Costa Concordia off the Tuscan coast with 4,200 people on board did not relay correct information either to the company or crew after the ship hit rocks, the cruise ship owner’s boss said as the search resumed for 21 missing passengers.