A couple of Italian terraplanists, convinced that the planet is flat, set off on a clumsy boat trip to find what, in their minds, would be the 'end of the world', the edge of the 'flat Earth'.
It sounds like a joke, but it's not. And who reports the case is the spokesman for the Italian Ministry of Health, the doctor Salvatore Zichichi.
The case happened three months ago, but Salvatore decided to tell it now, as Italian newspaper La Stampa reports. Salvatore told that he is used to dealing with migrants in trouble on the high seas, since his job is related to the administration of the Palermo coast garrison, and he did not expect terraplaners.
"The two left Veneto during the lockdown for Lampedusa, violating all restrictions. In Termini Imerese, near Palermo, they sold their car and bought a small boat, determined to head for the island."
The journey, however, ended in Ústica, where they arrived tired and thirsty, having taken the wrong way, running the risk of shipwreck.
"The funny thing is that they were orienting themselves with a compass, an instrument that works on the basis of terrestrial magnetism, a principle that they [the terraplanists] should reject," Salvatore ironizes.
The terraplaners gave the local authorities a hard time.
After arriving in Ústica, the authorities did not know what to do with them, since the whole of Italy was under lockdown and they could only get there under authorization. After discussion, the mayor and the city guard decide to escort the small boat to Palermo and the two inexperienced sailors are subjected to a fifteen-day preventive quarantine on the boat itself. Until one morning they tryescape. Twice.
Due to the couple's inexperience in sailing, the boat was heading toward an uncertain destination and at a turtle's pace, which made it easy for the Coast Guard to approach and escort them to shore. After a while, the couple tried to risk another escape that ended up ending up at a man's house.
After all the trouble caused to the Italian authorities, the couple served a new quarantine and were forced to leave the boat at a port and continue the journey back to Veneto by land.
