On the 10th of April 1991, the Moby Prince – an Italian passenger ferry – collided with another ship, resulting in an oil fire on the deck of the Moby Prince. The crew promptly radioed for help, and herded passengers to a fireproofed room within the ship. The Moby Prince was mere minutes from a Port Authority base, and the fire was spreading relatively slowly. It seemed all but certain that they would be rescued in plenty of time… and yet, as the minutes ticked by, help never came. The fire on board the Moby Prince would turn out to be one of the worst maritime disasters in Italian history… in part because of a few tiny human errors and one tragic miscommunication.