Jim Kalafus
Member
One story which has appeared in several books, tangentally, is the story of the three women: Christina Corvino, of Mt Vernon New York; her sister in law, Margaret Carola, and Amelia Iazetta of Brooklyn, in cabin A-230. The story, until now, has never had a diagram.
Immediately after the collision, the Andrea Doria had rolled to starboard, and when the list stabilised the new waterline was about even with A Deck.
Crew members found Benvenuto Iazetta, in water up to his knees according to accounts, trying to pry the door to cbin A-230, at the edge of the impact area, behind which he claimed his wife and the other women were trapped. Iazetta was sent, unwillingly, to the boat deck, after being assured that a rescue party would be dispatched to open the door.
Like much else, that morning, the rescue effort seemed rather sluggish and very non-specific. En route to A-230, the men were called to by Mrs Wells, in A-236, whose daughter had been trapped when the bunks in the cabin collapsed and pinned her. While the men struggled to pry the child out of the pile, the ship rolled a bit and the bunk slid off. Mrs. Wells, her injured daughter, and the rescue party fled, the last people known to have escaped from the lower deck collision area.
One wonders if, as was later claimed, the rescue party truly became confused and assumed that Mrs. Wells and her daughter WERE the trapped party they were meant to save. "Three women in a cabin with a jammed door" and "A mother in the hallway whose daughter is pinned in a debris pile" are so infinitely different that one is left with two choices:
A) No specifics were given, other than "trapped passengers on A Deck," despite the fact that the crew who relayed the information had been at the door to A-230 and knew who was trapped there.
B) Specifics WERE given, but the men quite properly stopped to free the Wells child, and then abandoned the mission when the ship rolled and the pile of bunks moved off of the little girl.
Writers have commented that no one ever knew if the women were still alive behind the door, leaving the possibility that they might have been crushed to death on impact or shortly thereafter thrown into the sea as the Stockholm's bow retreated. But, check out the deckplan:
A-230 aligns with the furthest reaches of the damage area on the Upper Deck, where the hole was the broadest. The aft wall of their cabin aligns with the midpont of U-56, a cabin known to have survived as a "shelf" with half of the floor surviving on the edge of the hole. On Foyer Deck, one deck lower, the damage centered on F-178/80 and the crew cabins beside it. On A deck, the taper of the Stockholm's bow was even greater. A-230 faced AWAY from the impact zone. So, if the door survived, so too did the cabin behind it.
Use the staircase as something to establish scale on each deck.
Place your finger in the center of U-52, the centerline for Upper Deck damage. Then, keeping it there, scroll the deckplan downward. The presumed centerline for damage on A Deck is A-218. Given the taper of the Stockholm's bow, a small portion of A-228, in which Michael and Maria Russo and their two daughters were killed, would have survived.
Okay, one wonders then, exactly what DID happen to the occupants. The impact was severe enough to cause the bunks in A-236 to shear off and collapse. One assumes that there were probably similar cave-ins in the other rooms in this block. And, probably, the weight of a bunk with an adult in it crashing down upon the lower berth would have caused injuries to two of the women. Did Mr. Iazetta HEAR anything behind the door? Was he in contact with any of the occupants of the room as he tried to pry the door? Strange to say, all accounts are silent on this point.
Defenders of the crew are silent on this point, as well. Despite the relative stability of the ship, it seems that NO effort was made to search cabins and force doors in the impact zone. Mrs. Wells and daughter were discovered accidentally. The daughter of victim from the A-Deck cabins also recently stated, without elaboration, that her mother was ALSO trapped behind a jammed door and died when the ship rolled over well after sunrise.
Immediately after the collision, the Andrea Doria had rolled to starboard, and when the list stabilised the new waterline was about even with A Deck.
Crew members found Benvenuto Iazetta, in water up to his knees according to accounts, trying to pry the door to cbin A-230, at the edge of the impact area, behind which he claimed his wife and the other women were trapped. Iazetta was sent, unwillingly, to the boat deck, after being assured that a rescue party would be dispatched to open the door.
Like much else, that morning, the rescue effort seemed rather sluggish and very non-specific. En route to A-230, the men were called to by Mrs Wells, in A-236, whose daughter had been trapped when the bunks in the cabin collapsed and pinned her. While the men struggled to pry the child out of the pile, the ship rolled a bit and the bunk slid off. Mrs. Wells, her injured daughter, and the rescue party fled, the last people known to have escaped from the lower deck collision area.
One wonders if, as was later claimed, the rescue party truly became confused and assumed that Mrs. Wells and her daughter WERE the trapped party they were meant to save. "Three women in a cabin with a jammed door" and "A mother in the hallway whose daughter is pinned in a debris pile" are so infinitely different that one is left with two choices:
A) No specifics were given, other than "trapped passengers on A Deck," despite the fact that the crew who relayed the information had been at the door to A-230 and knew who was trapped there.
B) Specifics WERE given, but the men quite properly stopped to free the Wells child, and then abandoned the mission when the ship rolled and the pile of bunks moved off of the little girl.
Writers have commented that no one ever knew if the women were still alive behind the door, leaving the possibility that they might have been crushed to death on impact or shortly thereafter thrown into the sea as the Stockholm's bow retreated. But, check out the deckplan:
A-230 aligns with the furthest reaches of the damage area on the Upper Deck, where the hole was the broadest. The aft wall of their cabin aligns with the midpont of U-56, a cabin known to have survived as a "shelf" with half of the floor surviving on the edge of the hole. On Foyer Deck, one deck lower, the damage centered on F-178/80 and the crew cabins beside it. On A deck, the taper of the Stockholm's bow was even greater. A-230 faced AWAY from the impact zone. So, if the door survived, so too did the cabin behind it.
Use the staircase as something to establish scale on each deck.
Place your finger in the center of U-52, the centerline for Upper Deck damage. Then, keeping it there, scroll the deckplan downward. The presumed centerline for damage on A Deck is A-218. Given the taper of the Stockholm's bow, a small portion of A-228, in which Michael and Maria Russo and their two daughters were killed, would have survived.
Okay, one wonders then, exactly what DID happen to the occupants. The impact was severe enough to cause the bunks in A-236 to shear off and collapse. One assumes that there were probably similar cave-ins in the other rooms in this block. And, probably, the weight of a bunk with an adult in it crashing down upon the lower berth would have caused injuries to two of the women. Did Mr. Iazetta HEAR anything behind the door? Was he in contact with any of the occupants of the room as he tried to pry the door? Strange to say, all accounts are silent on this point.
Defenders of the crew are silent on this point, as well. Despite the relative stability of the ship, it seems that NO effort was made to search cabins and force doors in the impact zone. Mrs. Wells and daughter were discovered accidentally. The daughter of victim from the A-Deck cabins also recently stated, without elaboration, that her mother was ALSO trapped behind a jammed door and died when the ship rolled over well after sunrise.
