This article is from page 18 of the 2011-09-06 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 18 JPG
KILRUSH was once considered as a potential site for the Harland & Wolff shipyard, but it’s as close as the West Clare capital came to the Titanic – the ill-fated White Star Line ship that came to a watery end on the Atlantic 100 years ago next April.
Until now that is, because this Tuesday – 150 years after Harland & Wolff nearly made a home for itself in Kilrush – the Titanic is finally coming to West Clare thanks Jackie Whelan’s West Clare Railway in Moyasta that’s being given a lead part in new documentary on the most famous vessel in maritime history.
International distributor ZDF Enterprises is co-producing a € 1.6 million documentary on the men below the Titanic’s deck with Irish production company Tile Films and German-based Gebrüder Beetz Filmproduktion.
“They’ve come to the West Clare for a couple of reasons,” Whelan told The Cla re People this week. “I have the only steam-operated engine in the country and the final journey made by a lot of people before they boarded the Titanic was on a steam train. “They are re-enacting that scene, while they also want to film the boiler we have in the Slieve Callan engine, because in many ways its similar to the boilers that were used to power the Titanic,” added Whelan. Saving the Titanic, which will be available to mark the 100th anniversary of the ship’s sinking on April 14, 2012, will use eyewitness accounts to tell the story of six engineers who were below the Titanic’s deck. The production budget is more than € 1.6 million and will include largescale re-enactments and computer generated imagery to bring to life the last hours of the Titanic. The Irish/German co-production is being funded by ZDF Enterprises, RTÉ, the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland and the Irish Film Board. “It’s great that they’re coming back to the West Clare,” said Whelan. “Four or five different film crews have been here for filming and it’s great publicity for what we are trying to do,” he added. The West Clare Railway’s first brush with film came back in 1956 when acclaimed Holywood director John Ford used the narrow gauge railway to film