Crafted entirely from meticulously shaped stone, the entrance portal is flanked by ornate columns supporting an arch-tympanum, with a centrally positioned circular window illuminating the interior.

Military actions in Sicily ended on August 17, 1943, with Italy signing an unconditional armistice with the Allied forces on September 8 of that year.

[7] In the early hours of December 26, 1996, a fishing vessel F174 carrying more than 300 South Asian migrants sank off the coast of Sicily and 283 of them drowned.

The catastrophe happened when the Yohan, a merchant ship carrying the migrants from Greece, approached the Sicilian coast and nearly three hundred people were transferred from the freighter to a fishing boat that measured 18 by 4 metres (59 by 13 ft).

Harbor officials and fishermen from the port of Portopalo kept silent and the Italian government denied the tragedy ever took place, and refused to accept the testimonies of survivors.

Salvatore Lupo, a local fisherman, began speaking out about the accident in 2001 after he found a victim's identification card in his fishing net.

He then helped a journalist, Giovanni Mario Bellu working for La Repubblica, locate the wreck with an underwater robot equipped with cameras.