On the 27th June 1980, 25 years ago, at 21:00, the radars of Fiumicino italian airport lost contact with Itavia 870, a DC-9 flying from Bologna to Palermo. The day after, the first corpses began resurfacing the water off the island of Ustica. Of the 81 people on board, none survived, only 37 corpses were recovered. That of Ustica was, and still remains, after 25 years of investigations, one of the deepest italian mysteries. Immediately afterwards most italian newspapers claimed the plane was shot down by a missile. Further investigations proved the plane exploded mid air, although being unable to demonstrate if a missile had actually been responsible for shooting down the plane, or a bomb went off in the women's toilet, on board the DC-9. On the 28th June, NAR, a fascist group, claimed responsibility for the DC-9 explosion. It was later proven it was a cover up by the italian secret service, SISMI, at the time influenced by the masonic lodge P2. The mystery thickens when on 18 July a wreckage is found on mount Sila, in southern Italy, a few hundred miles from Ustica. it was the wreckage of a lybian Mig-23, shot down on the night of the 27th June, as confirmed by the state of the corpse found on board the airplane. Officer Alberto Dettori, in service at the Grosseto air base later on confessed his wife "That night we went near war". In 1987, Dettori was found dead, just before being questioned by judges investigating the case.
On 10 June 1987 the DC-9 wreckage is located 3.700 meters below the Tyrrhenian sea. The delay in the wreckage location is still unexplained. The wreckage is recovered and thosuands pieces of the hulk are assembled within a hangar in Pratica di Mare. Not all the fragments, however, belonged the DC-9. Most of the unidentified fragments soon disappeared, as also the radar tracks. Of the 17 military radar stations which could have recorded the DC-9 accident, including the USS Saratoga, just 5 were allegedly active at the time, none of them could provide the radar tracks for that night. On 16 march 1989, italian magistrates conclude the DC-9 was shot down by a missile, however, in May, two of the judges belonging to the investigating commission, dismiss the missile hypothesis, claiming a bomb went off in the women's toilet. Strangely, the sink belonging to the women's toilet was found some months later, lying intact on the bottom of the sea. In march 1993 Alexj Pavlov, a former KGB colonel, admits the plane having been shot down by a missile. He doesn't however disclose by whom and why the missile was launched. In the meantime, radar trackings start resurfacing, showing unusual activity in the area, with at least 17 unidentified airplanes flying by. Experts from Washington, questioned by italian investigating commission, claimed at least one of the tracks could suggest the DC-9 was engaged and shot down, while another track, flying just under the DC-9 was recorded. According to the DC-9 records, the pilots last word was "guar-", meaning "look".
Even two italian F-104 were flying by that night, according to radar tracks. The pilots, both very experienced, launched on 27 June, the day DC-9 was allegedly shot down, lauched a general alert twice, the highest level of alert for italian army. More strangely,on 29 august 1988 both the pilots died during an accident at Ramstein, in Germany, occured during an acrobatic exhibition, causing 59 victims amongst the public, when both their two planes crashed.
In 2004, the 24 years long trial didn't bring any closer to truth about what happened at Ustica. Four italian generals were found guilty of having hidden information and destroyed proofs. None of them has ever spent a day in prison up to now. Today, 25 years after the Itavia DC-9 was shot down at Ustica, we still don't know by whom or why 81 people died, and many more were later on found dead on mysterious circumstances.
