Italy will start the underwater recovery of bodies from a shipwreck off Libya on the one-year anniversary of what is considered the worst ever Mediterranean migration accident, an Interior Ministry official.
Prefect Vittorio Piscitelli, a special envoy for missing persons, said the Italian Navy believes that "at least 400" victims will be found inside the hold of the vessel, which lies about 157km northeast of the Libyan coast, 375m below sea level.
"These are the estimated numbers, but we do not rule out surprises," Piscitelli said at a news briefing at the ministry in Rome on Wednesday.
He said the navy, or Marina Militare, was going to lift up the vessel, cover it up and refrigerate it to conserve the bodies, and tow it to the Sicilian NATO naval base of Melilli, where forensic teams will work on identifying the bodies.
In the immediate aftermath of the shipwreck on April 18, 2015, rescue teams found 24 bodies and 28 survivors.
Later, a remotely operated device recovered more victims from the top of the wreck and surrounding seabed, but could not do anything for bodies crammed inside the boat.
Piscitelli said a total of 169 victims have been recovered so far, none of which have been identified.
Experts from more than 20 Italian universities have volunteered to try to give names to the dead, he added.
Victims will likely be buried in separate locations, as a plan to create a migrants cemetery in the southern region of Calabria, near a former concentration camp for Jews, had yet to secure necessary funding, the prefect indicated.
The sinking of the boat sent shock waves across the world last year, and jolted the European Union into tripling funding for Mediterranean rescue missions to prevent more deaths at sea.
Share
