Tweet
Robot sub hunts radioactive mob waste
Italian authorities have dispatched a robot submarine with a video camera to a shipwreck off the Calabrian coast to see if it’s carrying radioactive waste dumped by the mob in a lucrative disposal racket.
Calabrian prosecutor Bruno Giordano has cautioned in TV interviews that that until the contents of containers on the sunken ship are known, he can’t say if the allegations by a mob turncoat about the ship are true.
The robot sub began filming on a Saturday. On the following Tuesday, it was still unclear what the cargo held, or even if the ship was the Cunsky cargo vessel that turncoat Francesco Fonti has spoken about to magistrates and in interviews on Italian TV.
No name of the ship is visible, and it wasn’t known if someone had removed the name or if algae might have covered up writing. Giordano said the former mobster, Francesco Fonti, from the Calabria-based ‘ndrangheta crime syndicate, has claimed the mob sank “hundreds†of barrels of illegally disposed of waste.
The prosecutor, based in Paola, Calabria, has promised that if analyses do turn up toxic substances, the hunt would be on for more sunken ships.
Fonti claims mobsters made millions of dollars illegally dumping radioactive and other toxic wastes for northern Italian businesses. Fonti has said he himself has been involved in the alleged sinking of three vessels, including the ship the robotic diver is now filming.