Word: calamai
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Died. Piero Calamai, 75, captain of the Andrea Doria when, on July 25, 1956, the Italian liner collided with the Stockholm off the Nantucket coast and sank; in Genoa, Italy. Though a naval veteran of 39 years and both World Wars, Calamai retired to the hills of Liguria following the inquiry into the collision and never ventured to sea again...
Guido struggled to explain in artfully broken English. "Was a dark. Verry dark. But when Captain Calamai ask a question an' somebedy answer in Swidish, we knew we were cloze...
Less than a minute later Calamai noticed Stockholm's white lights ranged in a pattern to indicate that the Stockholm had turned to starboard towards Doria...
...ordered a sharp turn to port, personally pushed the button for the prescribed two-short-blast signal for port turn, and sent Andrea Doria churning through the dark sea at more than 20 knots in a desperate effort to cross in front of Stockholm. When Stockholm began her turn, Calamai testified, she sounded no warning signal. Had he been warned by signal of her starboard turn, he could still have swung to starboard. "Would that have avoided a collision?" asked a lawyer for the Italian Line. "Certainly," said Piero Calamai...
With some 40 other witnesses still to testify, Captain Calamai's was by no means the last word on the collision. But when the time came to weigh evidence in the cases involving $40 million in lawsuits, it would be a hard word to ignore because of his impressive manner and his solid record of 20 years of ocean-going command without mishap prior to the collision with Stockholm...