The “Memorial Monument” to the victims of aerial disasters and for the deceased airport workers

The idea of preparing a “Memorial Monument”, being a place of memory to remember the 118 victims of the Linate air disaster on 8 October 2001 and the deceased airport workers, was immediately agreed following the Linate tragedy. The artwork, again by Alberto Ceppi, consists of a large ellipse (a dominant geometric shape in the chapel), its base housing bronze symbolic representations of Linate airport: the control tower, the front of the airport and the “toboggan” (the place assigned to the baggage sorting), which was the place of the tragedy.

From the base a bevy of seagulls fly upwards towards the blue sky. The resurrected Christ dominates the centre of the ellipse; he transformed death into life (the vine branches with grapes) and pain into peace and joy (olive branches). The ellipse is surrounded by words from the Book of Wisdom: “the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment will ever touch them. In the eyes of the foolish they seemed to have died, and their departure was thought to be a disaster, and their going from us to be their destruction; but they are at peace. God tested them and found them worthy of himself; like gold in the furnace he tried them, and like a sacrificial burnt offering he accepted them.” (Wisdom 3:1-9).

This artwork was presented and blessed by Cardinal Tettamanzi in 2004.