Parco Nazionale dell'Asinara

Fornelli - Isola dell'Asinara

07046 Porto Torres (SS)

Municipality: Porto Torres

Region: Sardegna

The Visitor Center is situated in loc. Fornelli, in the southern section of the island. The structure was built in the early 1930s as sanatorium for tuberculosis patients. Over the years, the prison became an agricultural branch, and it became famous in the notorious 1970s with the prison riot involving the prisons all over Italy, aimed at obtaining better life conditions. It was General Dalla Chiesa who chose Fornelli as the safest structure in Italy. In 1980 it stopped being a prison for terrorists and became again an agricultural branch: this was the period of the kidnappers of Anonima Sequestri Sarda, recently condemned to very long penalties. A few years later, the maximum security prison was open again to welcome the 25 of the most dangerous prisoners. Afterwards, it was used again as agricultural branch, but the massacres of Capaci and Via D'Amelio brought back to the Island leading characters of the organized crime. This from 29th August to June 1997, year in which Asinara Island became heritage of the Italian people.