General Preziosa, together with members of the National Association of the Families of the Fallen and Mutilated of the Italian Air Force, took part in a ceremony at the Military Memorial of the Italian Air Force The Holy Mass, celebrated by the Military Chaplain of the Air Force General Staff, Don Antonio Coppola, was attended by the Air Force Chief of Staff General Pasquale Preziosa, the Commander of the Air Force Command, General Giuseppe Li Causi, some representatives of the staff of High Commands and Top Offices of the Capital, as well as the President of the National Association of Families of Fallen and Mutilated Air Force (ANFCMA), Rag. Cav. Mario Fausti, who, by now in a long and consolidated tradition, organises the significant ceremony in the funeral facility. A large representation of the National Air Force Association was also present. During the religious ceremony, the Airman's Prayer was read by an Air Force officer and the ANFCMA prayer by a representative of the association.
Immediately after the celebration, a ceremony was held with the laying of two wreaths at the “Eagles” Monument by the Chief of Staff of the Air Force and the President of ANFCMA, with the honouring of the fallen soldiers by a platoon in arms of the Air Force Command's Company of Honour, and the lighting of the lamp of fraternity. The ceremony was followed by another moment of recollection and remembrance in front of the tomb of Gen. Giulio Douhet, theorist of aerial warfare and author, among others, of the book “Il dominio dell'Aria” (The Dominion of the Air), published in 1921. Following the laying of a laurel wreath by Sq. Gen. (r) Giovanni Proietti, National Councillor of the Air Force Association in Rome, General Pasquale Preziosa recalled the significance of Douhet's work and theories and thanked the Air Force Association for its meritorious work in the daily preservation of aviation memories and traditions. The Air Force Memorial, the care, maintenance and custody of which are entrusted to the Summit Support Command, is a structure built with architectural lines that echo the rationalist style of the 1930s, with stylistic elements more typical of the 1950s (the period to which the building dates back), with straight and square lines that accentuate its monumentality and sacredness, which can be found both inside and on the façade surmounted by the Latin motto “Alis Induti Deum Petierunt” (with wings they ascended to God). The structure, with a longitudinal plan and a single nave, houses the burial niches and ossuaries of the Fallen of the Air Force of World War II, the Fallen in Flight, as well as the soldiers of the Armed Force who distinguished themselves in service for exceptional reasons. The monument “of the eagles”, located near the memorial at the top of the path leading to the memorial, consists of a group of eagles carved in a block of travertine. In it is the allegory of flight in its most salient aspects: Battle, Victory, Sacrifice.
