Europe or Death
After the terrible accident off the coast of Lampedusa in October 2013, when a boat full of migrants capsized causing the death of about four hundred people, the Italian Government together with the Italian navy implemented operation “Mare nostrum”, a grand patrolling operation at sea with ships and helicopters. The goal was to save those migrants who were trying to reach Europe from Africa on board of old boats or rafts before it was too late, before the Mediterranean sea became their tomb, as it has already been the tomb of thousands of Africans before them. For “Europe or Death” we followed an entire patrolling operation aboard the San Giorgio, recorded a complex rescue at sea with the camera, participated in the hours that followed the rescue, when the migrants, who were finally sure to have escaped death, relaxed, and the crew of San Giorgio, once the work was completed, calmed down. The two worlds then came into contact and brushed against each other for a very short and intense period, where the crew members and the migrants exposed and opened themselves to each other.