On 7/10/98 there was a press conference held at the Officers Club of the Italian Navy. The conference gave the first official news of the fact that construction of the first part of the roman ship has started and should be finished by the end of the year. Admiral Agostini who chaired the conference gave a brief overview of the contribution the navy had given in the 1920's which had made it possible for a plan of recovery of the wrecks to be made. The shipyards involved in the project presented details about the present state of the construction and Rosario D'Agata, president of the association Dianae Lacus, the association formed with the aim of building the ship, gave an outline of how the project had started with an article written by Prof. Gianfrotta of the University of the Tuscia near Viterbo, who had raised the idea that perhaps one day one of the Nemi ships might be reconstructed. That was the start of a collaboration which later extended to Dr. Marco Bonino, perhaps the most authoritative scholar on the Nemi ships, which slowly slowly brought the idea to ever more concrete realisation. Now that wood is actually being fashioned and put together we can say that the project is no longer an idea but becoming a fact.
The section of the hull which is being presently undertaken is the first 12 metres from the bow.The shipyards involved in the project are doing this work at their own risk in advance of sponsorship as an act of faith in the project and to demonstrate to potential sponsors that this project is not all hot air but operative and serious.

There were several major Italian newspapers and magazines represented in the audience and a selection of the texts printed will be put on line here within the next few weeks. Also present in the audience was the son of Guido Ucelli the engineer who had carried out the original project of extracting the ships from the lake in the 1930's. Umberto Ucelli is also an engineer and has given his support to present project in concrete form by agreeing to meet all the costs of transporting the ship from the construction yard at Torre del Greco near Naples, to Nemi.

After responding to various questions from the press the conference closed with light refreshments put on courtesy of the Italian Navy.