AN OFFICIAL Greek inquiry will begin today into the fire on the Greek car-ferry Heleanna which turned a holiday voyage for more than 1,000 people into a nightmare.
The death toll stood last night at 26 while ships and aircraft continued to search the southern Adriatic for more bodies or survivors from the 11,674-ton vessel, a converted tanker, described by its owners as the biggest ferry in the world. Italian police last night arrested Mr Demetrios Antipas, the captain of the ferry on a charge of multiple homicide as he sought to leave Italy on another Greek ferry boat.
The 561ft ferry burned from stem to stern early on Saturday in the worst maritime disaster in Italian waters since the Second World War. Many survivors have accused the Greek crew of cowardice and incompetence in its handling of the disaster, but the ship’s owner, Mr Costas Efthymiades, called the allegations “irresponsible” and “exaggerated”.
Officials at Brindisi, where the captain, Mr Demetrios Antipas, aged 43, was asked to answer a technical questionnaire, said they were not even sure how many people were on board the Heleanna as it made one of its two weekly trips from Patras, in Greece, to the Italian port of Ancona. The Italian authorities said there were at least 1,125. On Saturday 1,089 crewmen and passengers, who included seven Britons, were saved and 271 of them were injured.
Captain Antipas said that the fire began at 5.30 am when a gas cylinder exploded in a kitchen. The flames spread quickly through the ferry and in six hours reduced it to a gutted shell which later drifted on to a sandbank south of Brindisi.
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The ship was about 12 miles off Brindisi when the fire began and the captain ordered passengers and crew to abandon ship at 8.30 am. By then, hundreds of passengers had leapt into the sea in nightgowns and pyjamas.
Several ships answered the radio call for help as the fire raged through the ship, consuming about 300 vehicles on board. Later Italian tugs took the ferry in tow but the lines broke in heavy seas.
The captain rejected allegations that he was among the first to abandon ship — “I was among the last” — and denied that the giant ferry was overcrowded.
Almost to a man, survivors accused the crew of not doing enough to help passengers and of not trying to quell the panic as the flames spread.
Some said the crew left the ferry first, ignoring crying women and children. They said that some of the lifeboats were never lowered and that others made off with only a fraction of their capacity of 58 persons.
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An Italian survivor yesterday went to the Brindisi police station and formally accused the captain of neglect.
Dr Pier Giuseppe Fiorito, a Milan engineer, had said earlier: “The captain was among the first to abandon the ship, and he was immediately followed by the crew. I saw them with my own eyes.”
Mr Antony Lawrence Wells, a trainee chartered accountant from Ealing, London, aged 25, escaped with his wife and five other Britons from the blazing ferry. With his wife, Sophia, aged 23 and Mr Geoffrey Pine, aged 25, a friend from Barnes, London, he was returning from a holiday in Greece.
Mr Wells said that he was picked up by the Lebanese tanker Universe Defender, where he met a British family of four — Mr Richard Brock, aged 39, a London barrister, his wife Eurichia, and their two children — Alexander, aged 8, and Julian, 5. Mr and Mrs Brock were hurt when they burnt their hands climbing down ropes into the sea.
“The first thing I knew was at 25 minutes to six when a German, who was sharing my cabin with two other people, shook me and indicated I should go upstairs,” Mr Wells said.