On that day, the computing system of CNUCE (Centro Nazionale Universitario di Calcolo Elettronico) in Pisa was connected to the U.S. ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network), marking Italy’s entry into the international network of computers that would go on to revolutionize communication, research and society.
With this connection, Italy became the fourth country in the world (after Norway, the United Kingdom and West Germany) to access the network originally developed in the United States.
The connection was made possible thanks to the SATNET satellite network, created through the collaboration between the National Research Council (CNR), Telespazio and Italcable. The signal started from CNUCE in Pisa, reached the Fucino Space Centre and from there was transmitted to the Roaring Creek station in Pennsylvania, allowing Italian researchers to connect to the U.S. network of computers.
Thanks to this infrastructure, for the first time Italian researchers were able to exchange data, application software and email messages with universities and research centres overseas, joining in real time an increasingly interconnected international scientific community.
The project was carried out thanks to the vision and commitment of a group of pioneers, including Luciano Lenzini, the creator and architect of the program, Stefano Trumpy, director of CNUCE and already a key figure in the 1970s SIRIO mission, and Antonio Blasco Bonito, the technical lead of the initiative.
In 1986, the significance of this connection was not immediately understood by public opinion and received no coverage from the media. The Chernobyl disaster, which had occurred four days earlier, dominated newspapers and television news. Today, however, it is clear that this event marked the beginning of a technological revolution that would profoundly transform the economy, research and everyday life.
Forty years later, the Fucino space Centre continues to be a strategic infrastructure for satellite communications and the development of advanced space services, confirming the leadership of Telespazio and the Leonardo Group in the field of technological innovation.
To learn more about this extraordinary chapter in the history of Italian innovation, watch the documentary “Login – The Day Italy Discovered the Internet”, conceived by journalist Riccardo Luna and directed by Alice Tomassini. Released in 2016, the documentary retraces the story of that first connection through archival footage and the testimonies of the people who made it possible.