The mother of a 27-year-old Italian man who died when he was hit on the head by a dislodged roller from a machine used to release a mooring rope at Palumbo Shipyards in 2016 has been awarded more than €200,000 in compensation.

A civil court found that the shipyard company was responsible for the fatality as it did not take the necessary precautions that would have prevented the death.

Mr Justice Toni Abela was ruling in a case brought by Maria Matruscelli, mother of Aniello Fariello who lost his life on January 18, 2016, while he was working on a ship docked at the Palumbo Shipyards. He was certified dead on the spot.  

The court heard how Fariello, an engineer, was performing his duties on board the vessel, which is registered in Limassol in Cyprus. While the vessel, MV Galaxy, was being moored, a reel through which one of the ropes was passed gave way and hit Fariello in the head with fatal consequences.

The worker's mother claimed that the company failed to take precautions required by law when the mooring operations were being carried out.

The court heard how the MV Galaxy was in such a bad condition that it had its certification revoked, had to be towed to Malta from Greece, and was in Malta for a total refurbishment.

The vessel was owned by Moby S.p.A and its captain was Antonio Scotto Ciccariello. Both were also sued by the mother, but the court found that they were not to blame for the incident that cost Fariello his life.

The captain told the court that Fariello was on the vessel every day and was giving Palumbo workers instructions on what they had to do. He said that on the day of the incident, Fariello was “in the wrong place, at the wrong time”.

In his judgment, Mr Justice Abela concluded that Palumbo knew about the unseaworthiness of the vessels docked at its facility and should not have exposed its employees to dangers on the vessel.

The judge said what was more of a concern was that there was no safety officer on board the vessel at the time of the incident and that the person who carries out the mooring of vessels had to be licensed.

The court noted that before such a vessel is manoeuvered, a meeting must be held between the shipyard authorities, especially with the safety officer and the berthing master as well as the commander and the ship boatswain to carry out a risk assessment to eliminate problems that may cause similar incidents.

Mr Justice Abela ruled that Palumbo was solely to blame for Fariello’s death and ordered it to pay his mother €209,000 in compensation.

Lawyer Frank Testa assisted Matruscelli.