PROJECTS

ACTIVE PROJECTS

Discover how and where SDSS is supporting researchers and Public Institutions
to study, document, and conserve the underwater cultural heritage.

THE BATTLE OF CONVOYS

During WW2 the Central Mediterranean sea was the theater of a long and dramatic fight between the Italo-German and the British Commonwealth naval and air forces.

The three-years-long struggle was aimed at both parts in ensuring their lines of traffic and in contrasting that of the enemies. Dozen of ships and hundreds of aircraft were sunk during 38 months of uninterrupted fightings.

THE BATTLE OF THE EGADI

The Battle of the Aegates was a naval battle fought on 10 March 241 b.C. between the fleets of Carthage and Rome during the First Punic War. It took place among the Aegates islands, off the western coast of Sicily.

It was the decisive engagement that ended a 23 year-long War and it gave to Rome the supremacy on the Mediterranean Sea.

PANTELLERIA THE CONVOY

Something quite big must have happened along the NE coast of Pantelleria island 2200 years ago.

The seafloor are between Gadir and Tramontana coves, a little more than a mile of coast, was litteraly covered by archaeological remains. Until the 60’s the coastal shallow waters were carpeted with Carthaginians amphorae.

AEOLIAN ARCIPELAGO - DEEP ARCHAEOLOGICAL SURVEY

The archipelago of the Aeolian Islands in the South Tyrrhenian Sea figured prominently in ancient civilization.

Their strategical position was contented by the central culture of ancient times, and their waters were central to merchant traffics, piracy, and naval warfares.

The seafloor of the archipelago is rich in distinctive remains of the ancient maritime activity.

EXPLORATIONS AROUND SIRACUSA

SDSS is committed to a long-term project that explores the seabeds of the Syracusan coast between the Plemmirio Marine Area and Capo Passero, at a depth ranging between 50 and 120 meters.

The project takes place in collaboration with the Plemmirio Marine Area and the Soprintendenza del Mare of Sicily.

Up to today the explorations brought to the discovery of the wrecks of a C47 and a Dornier 24 aircrafts, both shot down in 1943, as well as that of a medieval wreck carrying a load of pottery, and of a concentration of Greek amphorae from the 4th century BC.

This project is constantly in progress.