Statue installed in Bantry Bay to commemorate Air India & Oil tanker explosion victims

A seven-metre bronze sculpture has been installed in Bantry, west Cork, to commemorate around 400 people who died in tragedies in and around Bantry Bay.
The dead include 329 people who perished when an Air India flight was bombed 21 years ago and 51 people who lost their lives when an oil tanker exploded at Whiddy Island in 1979.
In 1985, 329 people lost their lives when an Air India flight from Toronto via London to Bombay was blown up off the Irish coast.
On 8 January 1979, a French tanker, Betelguese, exploded as it unloaded crude oil . 50 people died in the explosion. Another person died subsequently.
Cork County Council, Bantry Town Council and the local harbour board commissioned the sculpture.
It was created by Paddy Campbell, owner of the Campbell Bewley catering group, at his studio in Florence in Italy.
The sculpture, 'The Spirit of Love', comprises a man and a woman reaching towards each other to touch hands.
08/12/06 RTE.ie, Ireland

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