The Shipwrecking News

On matters nautical for a brief moment it would appear that another ship has collided with Italy.  This appears to be becoming a bit of a habit for seafarers in that part of the world.  I've heard Italy called a lot of things over the years but "hazard to navigation" is new one.  Let's face it Italy has been in roughly the same place for long enough to appear on most charts.  There shouldn't be too many people who set sail from Dubrovnik, say, en route to Marseilles suddenly yelling "What the hell's that?" when Italy appears over the horizon.

The latest incident involves a cargo ship backing into the Genoa Port Authority tower.  Andrea Doria must be spinning in his grave.  For context, colliding with the port authority tower is rather like commencing your driving test by rear ending the examiners car.  It's a little difficult to tiptoe away and pretend nothing happened.

Certainly Italy is in an inconvenient position, sticking out as it does into the Mediterranean but honestly there is a fair amount of open water on three sides of it.  Anybody attempting to sail to the fourth side should expect shallow water, and mountains.  Part of the problem I suspect is that for the most part collisions at sea are rather rare.  There is a hell of a lot of water out there and all the ships in the world don't make much of a dent in it (although they are putting a bit of a dent in Italy).  This holds true until you get to port.  It's analogous to driving down an empty road, the danger is in the parking.

In light of Italy's new found vulnerability to at sea collisions I think it is up to me to provide some helpful advice to ship captains attempting to navigate (apparently a more flexible term than I believed) the waters around it.

• Firstly; equip yourself with a helpful phrasebook including lines like, "Excuse me, your fiat uno appears to be entangled in my propellor" and "I'm very sorry, I swear there was an ocean here yesterday".
• Secondly; make sure your satnav is one of the more modern ones that includes Italy.  Any one manufactured after the birth of Christ should suffice.
• Thirdly; I don't care how much time it will shave off your journey, don't listen to the guy who says he knows a shortcut via Milan.
• Fourthly; if you do look out over the bridge and see the Colosseum gliding past, its probably time to hit the brakes and reverse.

The final thought for anybody plying the seas around Italy is this.  Italy may not be the largest or most impressive country on Earth but its still pretty solid.  If you hit it you may scrape some paint but the only things that will be sinking are your ship and your career.