Friday 2 September, one year after entering the Naval Academy, 101 students gathered in the local "third team" of the Vespucci to choose the name, the motto and the Corsican flag, they went up on the flagpoles to hoist their flag on the mainmast and shout their name to the tumultuous and cold waters of the North Sea for the first time: Ateires (pronounced Ateirès).
Once on deck, the students were greeted by jets of water from the hoses with which the ship's crew celebrated the event, a tradition that unites every officer who has attended the Academy and which will remain engraved in the memory of the students. throughout their career.
Ateires it means invincible, inflexible, indomitable. Used in the Greek tradition to indicate the hardness and indissolubility of the metals with which the combatants' weapons were forged, it is also used to describe the inflexible heart and steadfastness of mind, the invincible strength and indomitable temperament of the heroes of classical mythology .
The tests to which the students were placed did not change their souls that preserve the willpower and guard the values of the Navy. The motto of the course, "Ubi alii vitant, intrepidi pugnamus" (ie Where others flee, we fearlessly fight), expresses the tenacity and spirit of sacrifice with which they have already faced the first challenges, certain to face with equal tenacity those that the future will reserve.
