This article is from page 6 of the 2012-10-02 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 6 JPG
DESPITE the fact that Shannon was up and running by the start of World War II, having had its historic first landing in May 1938 when an Army Air Force Avro Anson Bomber touched down in Rineanna, it seems that the new airport wasn’t considered of strategic importance to Germany.
That’s according to the top-secret Militärgeographische Angaben über Irland document, which identified key strategic sites in the county to play a part post-German invasion of Ireland and its subsequent occupation.
Across the estuary, Foynes port, a transatlantic flyingboat base, was one of the sites mapped, but Shannon wasn’t considered to be vital to German plans in Ireland. This is despite the fact that less than two months after Operation Sealion was abandoned by the German high command, the fledging airport was plunged into the centre of a diplomatic incident that could have conceivably sparked a British invasion of Ireland.
The incident occurred on December 19, 1940, when German Ambassador to Ireland, Edward Hempel, informed Eamon de Valera’s government that a Lufthansa plane would be landing at Shannon carrying extra diplomatic staff for the German Le- gation in Dublin.
Any move by Mr de Valera to refuse permission to Germany to increase its staff would have compromised Ireland’s neutrality, while giving the green light for a German landing at Shannon had the potential of provoking a British invasion of Ireland.
In the end, Mr de Valera agreed to Germany’s request, but insisted that the Germans could only come to Ireland by a normal commercial air route and that if they landed in any other way they would be arrested.
Ambassador Hempel agreed to this stipulation before it was realised that all commercial plans from Europe were required to land in Britain, which would have resulted in the immediate arrest of the German officials.