The fate of the tanker ship Romagna was decided by a strategic disaster of the Italian Navy. It was the August 2nd 1943 that, while carrying a precious cargo of fuel from Arbatax to the port of Cagliari, the ship collided against a mine which was part of a mine-field recently settled and badly reported from the headquarters to the captain of the ship.
The deflagration combined with the load of fuel in the holds had devastating effects: such a blast that the bow was fully ripped off and sank immediately while the remaining stern section, burning and out of government, kept on drifting away for about half a mile from the point of impact with the mine, sinking few minutes after.
Today we find the stern section, about 60 meters long, lying in a perfect sailing trim on a sandy bottom 42 meters deep, with the bridge and the superstructures that rise up tapping 30 meters of depth.
The wreck is literally wrapped in an extraordinary amount of anthias, damselfishes, breams and picarels which sometimes cover almost completely the view of the structure, while the twisted metal has become a safe shelter for huge groupers, scorpion fishes, moray eels and congers. Remarkable also the amount of tubeworms and nudibranchs.
The propeller and the rudder are spectacular, huge and perfectly preserved, making themselves this wreck worthwhile to be dived, deservedly regarded as one of the most beautiful in the Mediterranean.
The dive on Romagna wreck is dedicated to advanced recreational divers, while technical divers will have available a respectable bottom time to be spent, even penetrating the corridors and the engine room, admiring the wreck in all its splendor both inside and outside.