Squarciò and Blast Fishing: When the Groupers in La Maddalena Could Hear the Fireworks

Anyone who goes out to sea in La Maddalena today seeks silence, deep blue waters, and the slow passage of a grouper. But if we could travel back in time to the 1950s, the underwater archaeology of the archipelago would tell us a far noisier story. It is the story of Squarciò born Pasqualino Rivieccio the island’s most famous and unruly sailor, who later became a worldwide literary and cinematic legend. Today, we divers enter the water equipped with wrist computers, fins, and scuba tanks solely to admire the wonders of the sea, while Squarciò hunted fish from the surface using something far more unstable and dangerous: leftover explosives from the Second World War.

Imagining the scene at Cala Gavetta during those years, we would immediately realize just how distant that world was from our modern idea of the sea. Squarciò’s fishing was a high-risk, high-volume business, where the method was as simple as it was insane: locate the school of fish from the boat, throw in the homemade explosive, wait for the blast, and dive in to collect the catch before it sank. It was a thrill that no lifeguard or maritime authority would approve of today, yet at the time it represented the daily struggle of a man fighting poverty on a beautiful but still wild island. Squarciò was no ordinary fisherman, but rather a kind of romantic pirate, respected by the community while constantly pursued by the authorities in an endless game across the waves of the archipelago.

The true story of Pasqualino came to a tragic end because of one of those cursed explosives, but his legend became immortal thanks to the pen of the Maddalena-born writer Franco Solinas. In the famous film adaptation of his novel, The Wide Blue Road, the role of our dynamite fisherman was played by none other than international star Yves Montand, who brought the charm of Hollywood to the reefs of La Maddalena long before modern diving centers even existed. Today, looking at the protected seabeds of the National Park rich with life and more carefully preserved than ever that past built on explosions seems like pure science fiction, and yet it remains part of the deep DNA of these rocky islands.

The next time you dive into the waters of Spargi or Budelli and hear the silence broken only by the steady rhythm of your bubbles, spare a thought for Squarciò and for how much times have changed. We have happily replaced dynamite with underwater cameras and the old forced harvesting of the sea with the pure pleasure of observing marine life in its natural habitat undoubtedly a major step forward for the survival of the groupers. Once back on board and out of your scuba gear, the best way to honor this incredible island memory is to seek out, in the bars of La Maddalena, the special emerald-blue cocktail created in his honor perfect for raising a toast to the maritime history of La Maddalena and to those who lived it in a decidedly adventurous way.