A-Infos (en) Italy, FAI, Umanita Nova #12-25: Fighting to the last mile. The Moby Prince massacre (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

34 years have passed since the Moby Prince ferry massacre in which 140 
people died, all the passengers and crew of the ship, except for a 
single survivor. In these long years, the families of the victims have 
led a determined and painful fight for truth and justice, never 
recognized by the institutions that until now have done nothing but 
cover up the responsibilities of shipowners and authorities. A massacre 
that is often listed among the so-called mysteries of Italy but whose 
dynamics are, at least in some fundamental elements, terribly clear. At 
10:03 pm on April 10, 1991, the Moby Prince ferry left the port of 
Livorno bound for Olbia in Sardinia. As soon as it left the port, at 
10:25 pm, the ferry collided with the oil tanker Agip Abruzzo (owned by 
SNAM, now ENI), which was anchored in a prohibited position, in the exit 
cone of the port, loaded with product that caught fire following the 
collision. The fire also spread inside the ferry, spreading rapidly. The 
terrible safety conditions in which the Moby Prince, owned by Nav.Ar.Ma 
of the shipowner Onorato, was traveling, and the non-management of the 
rescue by the Port Authority of Livorno - in fact, the rescuers only 
boarded the ferry the following morning, while the crew of the tanker 
was promptly rescued - certainly played a decisive role in causing what 
is remembered as one of the most serious massacres at sea and at work.

Like every year, last April 10 the main initiatives for the anniversary 
of the massacre were held in Livorno. Many family members were present 
both at the commemoration in the council chamber of the Municipality of 
Livorno, and at the demonstration that crossed the center of the city to 
the plaque in memory of the victims at the port. The president of the 
third parliamentary commission of inquiry charged with identifying the 
causes of the disaster, speaking in the council chamber, announced - 
with emotion - that the commission's work was close to being concluded, 
that the investigation was now "in its final mile". An expression echoed 
by various politicians present, some of whom were of national 
importance, who have been present in a particularly visible way this 
year. Perhaps an institutional presence that wanted to balance the 
indignation of the family members at the words of the Livorno prosecutor 
Agnello, who just over a month ago, heard by the parliamentary 
commission, has - among other things - brought up the fog among the 
causes of the disaster. A version often used in the past to cover up the 
various responsibilities and pass off the whole affair as a "tragic 
fatality". Of course, if the commission were really close to concluding 
its work, and were to officially recognize even just some of the 
excellent responsibilities that the family members have been denouncing 
for years, it would be the result of years of tenacious struggle by the 
family members themselves together with the organizations that have 
always been in solidarity with them.

This is what Giacomo Sini, son of one of the victims and comrade of the 
Livorno Anarchist Federation, also argued in his speech. Below are some 
parts of his speech held on April 10 in the council chamber:

«We are talking about the last mile, we are at the end, there have been 
three parliamentary commissions of inquiry. Not one or two, even three, 
and the third is still working. It is true that all of them have worked 
assiduously and well, with interesting ideas. But those ideas have 
arrived only thanks to the exhausting and painful work that has been 
done by us, relatives of the victims. There is a need to deliver a 
historical truth. But what is the historical truth without justice? 
Nothing. We, relatives of the victims, have already created the 
historical truth, with our struggles and battles carried out over the 
last 34 years. The historical truth has come out of the squares, from 
the movements, from the solidarity that has also come to us from 
relatives of victims of other massacres, such as Viareggio. The 
historical truth comes from having pointed the finger - naming them - 
against the real culprits of the affair. However, the historical truth 
is also made up of battles that have been fought in this city. A 
complete historical truth is one that takes these battles into account. 
Battles fought also by people who unfortunately can no longer speak 
today because 34 years have passed. The historical truth also consists 
in considering the battle against the shipping company, and today here 
in the town hall I am surprised that its name has not yet been 
mentioned, that of a culprit, that of the shipping company Nav.Ar.Ma. 
and its owners. In 34 years we have always remembered it and we have 
always pointed the finger at it. Because, if we have launched 
accusations over the years, we have not done so - as the judiciary has 
done - against those who worked on that ferry, whether it was the crew 
or the person who was driving the ship. Because it is not those who get 
on a ferry who make mistakes. That night there were no mistakes on the 
part of the crew. When we launch accusations about some problems that 
were on board the ferry, we do so against those who put those ships to 
sea, therefore the owner, the shipowner, and this must be clear once and 
for all. When we talk about mistakes we do so in reference to the 
"before" and the safety conditions of the Nav.Ar.Ma ferries. Therefore, 
if we want a complete and real historical truth we must also talk about 
the responsibilities of the shipowner and the problems that ferry had. 
And so I demand that this third commission review what was also said in 
the first commission, the hearings, what our civil lawyers exposed and 
that were considered in the work of the first commission»

Here we are referring first of all to the sprinkler fire prevention 
system, which was off, as also reported by engineer La Malfa. If it had 
been on, the rooms would probably have cooled down and someone would 
probably have survived, if help had arrived. Then there is the issue of 
the voltage drops on the Moby Prince's VHF radio which therefore did not 
work properly. Even Tomasin, who was a radio operator on the Moby Prince 
before the massacre, says that the VHF would have "had problems: there 
were false contacts between two wires and the welding, due to the 
vibrations or jolts, was not well done and did not hold up". So let's 
imagine what could happen to the system in the event of a collision 
between the ferry and the oil tanker. Finally, there is the issue of the 
non-functioning of one of the two radars on the ship. Bachechi, a 
"Telemar" employee who had been called on the Moby Prince for a repair 
says: "I reached a certain point in the work where spare parts were 
needed, pieces that were not available so we could not complete this 
repair, then there was no follow-up because at the time the obligation 
was that only one radar had to work. That radar brought the image from 
the opposite side, it is as if the observer were looking at it from 
behind. As a representation it is as if the entire image moved 180°".

«Seeing the president of the commission who gets emotional - Giacomo 
Sini also said - is only a pleasure, because it means that our story has 
reached your heart and then, if that is the case, all this must also 
reach the heart of the prosecutor because we often ask ourselves now 
"what to do?" and it has already been mentioned by other relatives 
before me, the investigation for the massacre is still open at the 
Livorno Prosecutor's Office, and the intent is demonstrated by the 
desire, for example, of the Port Authority not to save the 141 people on 
board the ferry. It is true, the prosecutor recalled things that are now 
past, he returned to points that have now been clarified and proven to 
be false, but we must also read between the lines of his hearing. His 
analysis was a reading of the facts that came to him through documents 
and the work of his predecessors. Agnello is not one of our civil party 
lawyers, he is a Public Prosecutor and when considerations of a certain 
type come out of his mouth, they must be taken into consideration 
because it means that something from the investigations underway by the 
Livorno judiciary is coming out. For example, considerations regarding 
the safety that the AGIP Abruzzo was not in a correct position, but in a 
no-anchoring zone, something that had never come out officially from the 
courtrooms of the prosecutor's office, are fundamental. The prosecutor 
wonders how it is possible that the Harbour Master's Office allowed such 
a practice.
In addition to this, although it had already been mentioned in the past, 
he went so far as to recall the total lack of coordination of the rescue 
operations and, no less importantly, the misdirection made on the matter 
of defining the survival times on board, which were several hours and 
not 30 minutes. In fact, the case of Rodi was recalled, whose body was 
filmed that morning intact, lying on the Ponte Sole 2 stern, a sign that 
he had managed to get on it only a short time before. When the ferry was 
towed to port, in a film taken shortly after, his body ends up burned 
like the others around him. Agnello also recalled, calling it 
"ambiguous", the insurance agreement between Nav.Ar.Ma. and ENI in which 
the two companies did not accuse each other, but rather, found a point 
of agreement on covering, on the one hand, the compensation to the 
victims and, on the other, the environmental damage caused by the 
massacre. The prosecutor speaks of new wiretaps made and listened to by 
the same judiciary, a new development that was made public in the 
hearing, committing to try to enter in the register of suspects 
individuals who, if not indicted in the past, could be accused today. We 
have always said all these things. Did Agnello listen to us? Maybe. Did 
he listen to and read the considerations of the commissions of inquiry? 
Certainly. It is therefore important today to try to understand where 
the Livorno Prosecutor's Office wants to go because the investigation 
into the massacre is still open and we must focus on that and we must 
not stop».

D.A.

https://umanitanova.org/lottare-fino-allultimo-miglio-strage-del-moby-prince/
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