Search operations are continuing at Lake Vico for Luigi Cavallari, the 84-year-old husband of Italy's Family Minister Eugenia Roccella, who has been missing since Saturday afternoon.
The alarm was raised on June 27th, at around 5 p.m., by Minister Roccella herself after Cavallari dived from a small boat into the lake and failed to resurface.
Rescue crews worked throughout the night in particularly challenging conditions. Specialist firefighter diving units from Rome have been joined by teams from Naples and Florence. The search has been hampered by extremely poor underwater visibility, which drops to almost zero at depths of just four metres.
To scan the lakebed, emergency services are deploying remotely operated underwater vehicles (ROVs) equipped with sonar and cameras, alongside aerial drones. Investigators have also carried out a drift simulation using a tender to reconstruct the boat's movement and identify the most likely location where Cavallari entered the water.
"We are doing everything possible in a very difficult situation and for a deeply tragic case," said Andrea Nino Caputo, deputy prefect of Viterbo, who is coordinating the rescue efforts.