Luciano is a ship belonging to the Venice Maritime Compartment. It was first purchased by the British and then Venice took control of it, using it as a military means of transportation. It was attacked by the British and sank in 1941 carrying 2000 tons of ammunition.
This cargo steamer was built in Britain by Earle's Shipbuilding & Engineering Company Ltd. of Hull and was completed in August 1913 under the name Maronian,
In 1938, the steamer was bought by the Venice-based company Servizi Marittimi Eugenio Szabados and renamed the Luciano. Following Italy's entry into World War II on 10 June 1940 and the subsequent need for merchant vessels to transport war materials, It was requisitioned by the Regia Marina (Italian Royal Navy) on 19: December, without being registered in the State Auxiliary Navy cadre.
After making four voyages between Apulla and Albania to transport supplies for the Royal Army, on 8 April 1941, the fifth, which would be the merchant ship's last, began.
The presence of several Italian ships near the Albanian city led the British to organise a new air raid and so, at 12:40 a.m. on 15th April, seven Fairey "Swordfish" biplanes of the 815" Naval Air Squadron of the Fleet Air Arm, commanded by Lieutenant Frederick Michael Alexander Torrens-Spence, took off from the Greek airport of Paramythia. Unable to detect the ships moored in front of Vlore because they were hidden by fog curtains, the aircraft headed towards the area of Ducati, in the southern part of the Bay, and spotted some of the units that were anchored there.
On that day, the Luciano and the steamer Goffredo Mameli, carrying a cargo of 3,594 tons of provisions and 3,685 tons of ammunition for the Italian Royal Army, left Brindisi and set course for Vlorë, protected by the auxiliary cruiser Brioni.
The Luciano, which was under the command of the istrian captain Marco Martinoll, was ordered to drop its anchor and unload the material in front of Pasha Limani in the most south-western part of the Bay of Vlorë, because of the dangerous nature of the materials it was carrying.
At 1:05 a.m. the steamer Stampalia was hit by a torpedo and shortly afterwards a similar weapon hit the Luciano, causing most of the over 2,000 tons of ammunition still on board to explode. The explosion of the ship caused a wave that reached a height of 4 metres; the wreckage was strewn hundreds of metres away and even a couple of these, weighing 2 tons each, were found about 800 metres from the Luciano.
Many of the shells stowed on the ship were also hurled far away from the steamer, and four ships were damaged by the air displacement caused by the explosion of the Luciano and its wreckage.
The Italian anti-aircraft defence shot down a "Swordfish" and its crew were taken prisoner.
Of the 35 men on board the Luciano at the time of the attack, 24 perished; the wreck of the steamer lies on a 26-metre sandy seabed and what remains of its deck is 14 metres above the surface.
There is still the wreckage and remains of an overturned lifeboat in the nearby area, and although the wreck of the steamer and part of the seabed were cleared between 2000 and 2010 by Albanian Navy workers, artillery shells and small weapon cartridges can still be found.
Building site:
Earle's Shipbuilding Company Ltd., Hull (UK)
& Engineering
Launch date: 18 June 1913 (under the name of Maronian)
Date of Commissioning: August 1913
Date of Requisition: 19 December 1940
Sank on: 19 April 1941
Length: 97.07 metres
Width: 12.90 metres
Gross tonnage: 3,329.19 gross tons Engine:
a three-cylinder triple-expansion steam engine, rated 249 hp, three boilers, one propeller
Maximum speed: 10.2 knots