Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1921-01-31
Steamers Crew
Tell Thrilling Tale
Fight with Flames

.'1CkSOnNlIe, L Id, JAIL oU-- iS
Italian steamer Nettuno en- route
from Port Arthur, Texas, to Brindisi,
Italy, was lowed into this port today
by the coast guard cutter Yamacraw
after being afire at sea.
Captain Bersini on arriving here
today attributed the saving of his
ship to a miracle-the explosion of
snuffed out the fire after it had ragged
unchecked for 20 hours. The blaze
started in the engine room from a
bursting feed pipe when the Nettuno
was four days out from Port Arthur
from which she cleared on January
q with a cargo of gasoline and feul
Gil. AT that time she was off the
Florida coast in the vicinity of Ber-
muda.
In few moments the Nettuno was
seething inferno amidships and it
did seem possible for her to remain
af1oat but short time, Captain Ber-
sini stated. Seated in his badly
damaged cabin here, Captain Bersini
described wildly the horror through
which he and the ships personnel
lived during the 20 hours the fire
ragged unchecked as the ship wallow-
ed helplessly in heavy seas. The crew
fought with desperation to keep the
fires from the gasoline stored in the
hold Of the vessel. The fight, how
ever, appeared hopeless, according
TO Captain Bersini and momentarily
he expected the flames to reach the
gasoline and blow the ship to atoms.
Practically every lifeboat aboard
the Nettuno had either been carried
the tanker received during the hours
the fire twisted and wrecked her en-
CINE room and warped and cracked
her steel decks and side plates.
Captain Bersini praised the work
of the chief engineers, Betteno and
Crosa, as well as of Engineer Landi
Joanna, who went below at the time
the feed pipe burst to shut off the
flow of oil and rescue two firemen
trapped in the fire room.
The Yamacraw. which had been
advised to look out for the Nettuno.
picked up the ship on January 20 and
headed for Jacksonville.
The Nettune is owned by the
Italian State Railways, her home
port being Palermo, Italy.
Newport News, Va, Jan. 3o-Three
members of the crew of the Italian
steamer Nettuno were landed at New
port News today by the Belgian steam
ship Kremlin and rushed to a hospital
for treatment of severe burns sustained
when fire occurred in the engine room
OF the Nettuno off the coast of Florida
last Wednesday. One of the men. Landi
vioganni, third engineer of the Nettuno,
Is not expected to live.
A stirring tale of heroism on the high
seas with Vioganni in the principal role
was told today by members Of the crew
of the Kremlin. A feed pipe in the en-
CINE room of the Nettuno, an oil burn
er, burst last Wednesday and the fire
spread through the engine room endan-
gering the lives of the two firemen who
were trapped and threatening the entire
ship.
Vioganni, the third engineer. voIun-
teered to go down into the engine room
and cut off the flow of oil from the
burst pipe and to rescue the firemen.
Fighting his way through the roaring
namos. he reached the pipe and man.
aged to stop the flow of oil and then
assisted the fremen to the upper deck.
When he reached the deck his clothing
had been burned almost entirely from
his body and his flesh was raw from
burns.