Salt Lake Telegram | 1937-08-12 | Page 4 | Docks of Naples Periled as Hospital Ship Burns

Docks of Naples Periled . As Hosiptal Ship Burns NAPLES. Aug. 12 (AP) A spectacular fire which threatened all the ahippinf In Naples harbor destroyed Italy'i prize hospital ship, the Helouan, early today while tens of thousands of per-rr per-rr includine hundreds of Americans, watched. One fireman was asphyxiated In the desperate and successful battla to save the waterfront. The wrecked ship, which had carried car-ried thousands of wounded and sick men from Ethiopia during the eon-quest eon-quest of that African empire and, more recently, had served to evacuate evacu-ate wounded Italian soldiers from Spain, where they had been fighting in the civil war, was towed In flames into deep water and sunk. The fire began at 4 st m. while Naples slept, but before the blase was ended practically every resident resi-dent of the city was out of doors. The blase was so intense and the flames were so high that the spectacle spec-tacle rivaled the periodic eruptions of Mount Vesuvius, overlooking the city. Americans Watch The majority of Americans witnessing wit-nessing the blase were awaiting the arrival of the hner Conte de Sevoia, which takes them to New York. The liner was kept from entering the harbor until the blaze waa under un-der control. Among the Americans was Dennis Cardinal Dougherty of Philadelphia, homeward bound from an audience with the pope. Authorities said the, fire originated origi-nated in the ship's medical department, depart-ment, either from a short circuit or the spontaneous combustion of medicines. The skeleton crew of 40, only men aboard at the time, fought the rap-Idly rap-Idly spreading blase until every available fireman ia Naples was at the scene. Tewed to Sea Ths master. Captain, Emanuel Nostretta, forcibly removed from the ship, waa the last man to leave. While streams of water poured Into the wrecked vessel, a tug managed man-aged to get a towline aboard. Still flaming, ths doomed ship was towed slowly across the harbor, clouds of smoke shot with spsrks and streamers stream-ers of fire pouring from her. At S:20 a. m, slightly more than four hours after the fire broke out, the hull sissled to the bottom of the see-