1 50 Men & a Girl

A mother's scream rose shrilly. Four-year-old Diana Svet, walking down the gangplank of the Yugoslav passenger-freighter Srbija at a Brooklyn pier last week, had broken away from her mother, started running, slipped and plunged into the narrow crevice between ship and pier.

On the instant, Pier Superintendent Ignazio Scibilia yelled an ail-ashore order to his crews, unloading copper from the Srbija. Some 150 husky dockers, used to emergencies, poured from the ship and other parts of the dock. Six loading tractors were swung around with noses pressed against the Srbija's side. Hawsers were slackened, 150 men and six machines pushed, the 10,000-ton ship was forced away from the pier. With just enough space to admit them, three men snaked down into the crevice, hanging on to steel stringers, 18 feet to black water.

Diana was floundering hopelessly when Joseph Zappulla grabbed her, passed her up to John Balzano, who passed her up to Joseph Sabino. Hands from above lifted her to safety. No more than three minutes had elapsed from her plunge to her rescue. With no space in which to turn their bodies, Zappulla, Balzano and Sabino wriggled up and out of the crevice, fainted from exhaustion on the pier.

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