Sixty Years Ago Today the Andrea Doria Wrecked, A Local Survivor Remembers the Night Well
Sixty years ago today the Andrea Doria wrecked. The Italian ship’s original path, from Italy to the United States, was altered irrevocably when it was T-boned 40 miles off the Nantucket shoreline by M.S Stockholm, an American-Swedish vessel.
Forty-six passengers were killed in one of history’s worst maritime disasters. Maria Leone remembers it well. The then-19-year-old Maria Bellomo was frazzled.
“I was all alone in a dance room. All of a sudden, we hear this bang. All glasses on one side of the dance room cracked. Everybody rushed on the balcony surrounding the ship. People said there was an accident. We saw ash flying,” Maria Leone said.
“My mom and elder brother were asleep two to three floors below the dance floor,” she said. “My dad and little brother were in the theater, also below. I was running down in my pumps to find my family, but everybody was pushing each other to go up. It was ‘get out of my way.’”
“I did not even see my dad or younger brother until I was rescued by the French liner.” The rescue itself was grueling.
Leone had thrown her pumps off and leaped on one of the French liner’s rescue boats after meeting up with her mom and older brother. Both Leone and her mom broke a toe and ankle while sliding down the rope. Additionally, Leone suffered from a gash on her left leg.
“I still remember the pain of that gash,” she recalled. “They sewed it up right after on the French boat.”
Leone managed to move on with her life after the accident. Her family moved to Seneca Falls, where she worked at Seneca Knitting Mill. One of her friends at the mill introduced Leone to her brother, Carlo Leone. A couple years later, they were married. Eventually, they had two children, Maria and Bernie. She saved the original ticket, many yellowing articles and the dress she wore that night.
In celebration of the 60th anniversary, an Italian movie producer has made a yet-to-be-released film based on the Andrea Doria. Leone is looking forward to seeing it.
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Source: Finger Lakes Times
