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The wrecked Italian cruise ship Costa Concordia is due to be raised and towed away in one of the biggest maritime salvage operations in history, the BBC reported.

Workers will slowly lift the vessel by pumping air into tanks attached to the ship. The refloating operation is expected to take six or seven days.

The ship will then be taken to its home port, Genoa, where it will be scrapped.

The Concordia struck a reef off the Italian island of Giglio in January 2012 and capsized, killing 32 people.

The wreck was hauled upright in September but is still partially submerged, resting on six steel platforms.

"It's a very complex operation," Franco Gabrielli, the head of the civil protection agency overseeing the salvage, told reporters.

"The first phase of the operation will be the most dangerous because the vessel will be detached from the platforms."

He added that a search for the remains of Indian waiter Russel Rebello, whose body was not recovered from the wreck, would be carried off after the vessel was moved.