Category: News

LIVING in a house overlooking Farhiy Bay in Baltard, Doonbeg is a blessing most of the year, but the storm and high tides at the beginning of the New Year made it a precarious place to call home.

Gearoid Greene along with his wife and five children were shocked as the spray from the storm and high tide of January 7 beat off the back of the house.

What made it all the more surprising was the fact that the house was far above sea level, looking down on the sea from a great height.

Shortly after 8am as the storm took hold the family were in fear of severe damage to their home and even considered moving while the storm abated.

The winds and strength of the sea blew in the stones from the periphery wall into the garden, leaving the back of the home, which faces on to the sea, exposed.

Wiring securing electric poles were also up rooted, in damage never witnessed in the area before.

As well as dealing with the clean- up of the storm and the rebuilding of the secure wall, this farming family must also contend with reseeding land covered by seawater, when and if it eventually dries, in time for this year’s harvest.

The cost of the bad weather continues to be counted.

FARMERS with land around Farihy Bay in Doonbeg are facing the possibility of a serious fodder shortage next winter as hundreds of acres of farmland remain water logged as a result of damage to a nearby sluice.

The sluice was installed by the Land Commission to channel water from the land when it would inevitable flood during extensive rainfall.

Heavy rainfall, coupled with storms and high tides resulted in land covered in salty water in the last fortnight.

A blockage coming from the back of the sluice means that water cannot flow freely and drain the land, leaving up to an estimated 300 acres of prime farm land flooded with sea water.

Thomás Flanagan and Gearoid Greene are just two of more than a half a dozen farmers affected by the break down in the infrastructure.

The farmers had employed a digger to clear the sluice of rocks lodge in the large concrete pipe, but to little or no avail as waves continue to carry debris over the sluice, which then lodges at the back of the sluice and eventually gets stuck in the stones of the main flow pipe blocking the water again.

Even high land that is not susceptible to flooding is not accessible to the farmers. Mr Flanagan explained that he cannot access prime grazing land which lies high above sea level as the access road has been washed away in the storm and the surrounding land remain water logged. At least 70 acres of Mr Greene’s land, which he would have used for silage in the spring, remains under seawater, the salt content of which continues to burn the land. He said he was very concerned about how he will access fodder for his cows next year.

“There will be houses in danger if this water rises again and the sluice is not sorted,” said Mr Flanagan.

“You don’t mind if you get have rain for a day or two and the water builds up once or twice a year; it will go eventually, but the problem we have here is the bits of rubbish get stuck between the stones and it blocks the stones. It will slow down the flow every time,” he said.

“About 80 per cent of the water went down when we cleared the sluice, but it is filling again. And if we get heavy rain it will be as bad again,” said Mr Flanagan.

In the 1990s their fathers paid to have the sluice repaired, but the cost of repairing the public infrastructure this time will cost significantly more, the farmers have warned.

The farmers fear that the repair of the sluice will fall between Clare County Council and the OPW and are anxious that one of the bodies take responsibility and rectify the problem immediately.

These full time dairy farmers rely on the income from their farms to support their young families, and while the sluice remains damaged their livelihood remains under threat, they explained.

A WEST Clare man who claims he walked 17 miles between Ennis and Kilrush while in a “drug haze” after he was arrested for breaking into a car has been ordered to comply with the Probation Services.

Sam Johnson (19) was arrested by gardaí after breaking into a car at Considine’s Terrace, Ennis on October 12, 2013.

Mr Johnson appeared at Ennis District Court on Wednesday where he pleaded guilty to two charges of illegally interfering with mechanically propelled vehicles.

Inspector Tom Kennedy told the court a resident of Considine’s Terrace contacted gardaí after she discovered her car had been moved from its original position to the middle of the car park.

Mr Johnson, with an address at New House, Cooraclare, was arrested after gardaí discovered his phone and a specimen of blood in the car. He was later released.

Insp Kennedy said gardaí received another report later that morning of a car being broken into at the Cross Roads Pub, Knockalough, Kilrush Road.

The court heard the owner had parked his vehicle at the pub before getting a lift to work in Meelick.

Insp Kennedy said Mr Johnson was seen in the car and arrested soon after.

Insp Kennedy said the accused was disorientated and intoxicated and was unable to give an explanation for his behaviour.

The court heard Mr Johnson has paid compensation of € 200 for the damage done to the car at Knockalough.

Mr Johnson has no previous convictions.

Defence solicitor Fiona Hehir said her client was still high on drugs and had no phone when he was released.

She said Mr Johnson walked from Ennis to the Cross Roads Pub.

“He was in a drug haze. There is no other way to explain it”, she added.

Ms Hehir said her client has not taken any drugs since the incident and is meeting with a drugs counselor.

The court heard that when asked by gardaí why he had broken into the car at Knockalough, the accused, said, “I wanted to buy the car.”

Insp Kennedy said the distance from Ennis to Knockalough was around 17 miles.

Asked by Judge Durcan if he accepted Mr Johnson’s version of events on the night, Insp Kennedy said, “No.”

“I don’t know how he got to Knockalough but I can assure you he did not walk it”, he added.

Judge Patrick Durcan said these were very serious offences. However he said Mr Johnson was in full time education and is taking steps to deal with substance abuse issues. Adjourning the case to April 2, Judge Durcan ordered a pre-sentence report from the Probation Services.

A DUBLIN man who allegedly struck another person with a glass on the night Clare welcomed home the county’s All-Ireland champion hurlers will have his case heard in the Circuit Court.

Judge Patrick Durcan refused jurisdiction of the case after hearing details of the alleged assault at Ennis District Court on Wednesday.

Darren Brady (39), with an address at Abbeyville Green, Swords Manor, Swords, Dublin, is charged with as- sault causing harm to a man at Dan O’Connell’s Bar, Ennis on September 29, 2013.

Garda Cormac Kelly of Ennis Garda Station gave evidence of arrest, charge and caution.

He said Mr Brady made no reply to charge after caution.

Inspector Tom Kennedy said the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) had directed summary disposal of case.

Garda Kelly outlined a summary of the alleged facts to allow Judge Patrick Durcan consider jurisdiction.

A medical report outlining the alleged injuries suffered by the man was given to Judge Durcan.

Garda Kelly told the court the alleged injured party was in the bar with his girlfriend.

He said it would be alleged Mr Brady started to behave inappropriately towards the woman.

Garda Kelly said, “He (alleged victim) asked him (Mr Brady) to leave her alone at which point he head butted the alleged injured party and struck him in the head with either a glass or a pint bottle”.

Judge Durcan refused jurisdiction. He said he was doing so based on the alleged evidence and the injuries allegedly suffered by the alleged victim.

Insp Kennedy said the case would now be referred back to the DPP. He told the court that a book of evidence would also be prepared.

Mr Brady is also charged with two public order offences arising out of the alleged incident at the pub.

He was remanded on bail to appear again at Ennis District Court on March 12.

AMAZING film from CCTV cameras at the playground in Lahinch during the early hours of Monday, January 6, shows massive waves sweep away recycling bins weighing half a ton as the playground disappears under water.

Clare County Council’s Paul Moroney, who monitored the footage explained that no human could have survived the ferocity of the waves and a car would have been crushed with the impact.

The senior engineer with the council’s water department showed the film to county councillors at a special meeting on Friday last in an at- tempt to depict the terrifying weather conditions the people living along the county’s coast were exposed to during the end of December and early January.

Shortly after 3am on the fateful morning a wave dislodged the bottle and can banks weighing 250kg each.

Three minutes before 5am all of the bottle banks were dislodged and moving at speed with the force of a wave across the playground.

Half an hour later the film captured the playground now under water and the final bank – the half tonne back containing wet clothes, being swept across the screen.

Just 20 minutes later, at 5.50am, the playground was full of water with none of the play equipment visible.

Mr Moroney explained that in flood hazard terms the area was calculated to be “extremely hazardous”, “making it hazardous to life”.

Just seconds later a wave took out the streetlights, and even though the cameras kept running the screen was black and the only sound came from an angry sea.

ENNIS’ effor ts to become Ireland’s tidiest town have been boosted by a € 4,000 increase in funding from Ennis Town Council.

At the council’s annual budget meeting last week, members unanimously voted in favour of a motion to allocate extra funds to the Ennis Tidy Town’s Committee.

Cllr Tommy Brennan (Ind) proposed cutting by half money allo- cated for the mayor’s allowance in 2014.

The Ennis councillor told the meeting the money could instead be given to Tidy Towns as Ennis would only have a mayor for another six months.

It is expected that the town council will be replaced by a municipal authority after this year’s local elections.

Cll r Brennan’s proposal came in response to a suggestion put forward by Cll r Brian Meaney (GP).

A Fianna Fáí l candidate in the 2014 local elections, Cll r Meaney called on the council to increase the increase the cost of using the town’s automated public toilets from 25 cents to 50 cents.

The meeting heard the proposal would generate additional income of € 2, 000.

The council estimates it will cost € 70, 000 to maintain and service the two ‘superloos’ in 2014.

Cllr Meaney’s proposal was supported by Cllr Johnny Flynn (FG) who said some of the extra income should go towards tackling the “graffiti epidemic” in the town.

However it was strongly opposed by other councillors. Cllr Brennan said, “For anyone even to suggest it is disgraceful.”

The council will give a contribution of € 16, 000 to Ennis Tidy Towns. Cllr Brennan said an extra € 4,000 could be found by cutting the mayor’s annual allowance. Cll r Brennan’s motion was unanimously voted through by all nine members. Cllr Meaney’s motion was defeated by five votes to four.

Town manager Gerard Dollard told the meeting the council would also look favourably on any application from the Ennis Defibrillator Committee for community grant funding. This was after a request from Cllr Paul O’Shea (Ind).

Going down on his knees as Tuesday’s meeting neared conclusion, Cllr O’Shea urged the council to provide financial support to the committee.

IT WILL cost almost € 24 million to repair storm damage to 60 kilometres of coastline and 35 specific areas of Clare County Council managed infrastructures, with bills for the Office of Public Works, to private individuals and community groups expected to run into millions of euros more.

According to the Preliminary Storm Damage Report submitted to the Government by the local authority on Friday, it was the “worst experienced in living memory”.

More information relating to infrastructure the council maintains is the responsibility of the OPW will be forwarded to the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government in the coming days.

These areas in question include Kildysart, Ballynacally, the Shannon embankments at Shannon Airport and Doonbeg at the site of the golf course.

“Clare County Council accepts there has been further significant damage to infrastructure not under the control of the council, in particular to estuary embankments along the Shannon Estuary and strategic tourism enterprises. An assessment of this damage will now be completed for the Government’s consideration,” said the county manager Tom Coughlan following a special meeting of the council.

The largest cost to the council will be repairing the promenade and dealing with the compromised rock armour at the seaside resort of Lahinch at € 5.84 million.

The county’s most westerly village of Kilbaha was also extensively damaged with repair work estimated at € 3.42 million, and a further € 622,000 estimated for Kilcredaun where six families were isolated from the main land for days.

Cloughaninchy, Quilty, which was the sight of devastating damage to homes is estimated to cost € 2.58 million.

Damage at New Quay is also over a million euros estimated at € 1.84 million with € 1.12 million of damage estimated to the N67 road at Moneypoint, Kilrush.

Senior engineer Tom Tiernan, who compiled the report, warned that the figures are as realistic as they can be at this early stage and are subject to change. He explained the vast bulk of the report relates to the destruction caused by the high winds and surging tides throughout the length of the Clare coastline through the first week of 2014.

“The vast bulk of damage caused by the first of the aforementioned three storms was most severely impacting inland – within 10 miles of the north and west coasts of the county. The vast bulk of the impact of the latter two events manifested itself at several locations along the county’s entire coastline and their respective severities are explained by the coincidence of very high tides, extremely low pressure centres moving in a south-west to north-east direction off the west coast of Ireland and severe south-west to west winds gusting at speeds of up to 150 km/hr onto the coastline,” he said.

YEARS spent studying the ocean off the North Clare coast paid off for Lisdoonvarna student Stephen O’Connell last week after he took first place in the Biological and Ecological Category of the BT Young Scientist Exhibition.

Stephen was one of six students from Mary Immaculate Secondary School to receive an award at this year’s Young Scientist. Indeed, nine of the 10 Clare projects at this year’s event came from Lisdoonvarna, with one project from Scoil Mhuire in Ennistymon also making the final.

Stephen, whose father fishes off the coast of Doolin and Liscannor, has entered the competition on two previous occasions, with each project exploring different aspects of fishing in the area.

Stephen profiled more than 1,200 crabs caught off the Clare coast and developed a method for separating low quality and high quality crab meat. His work could have a major impact on the quality of crab being produced by the Irish crab industry.

The school also had great performances from Rhianna McMahon and her brother Keelan who took second place in their category as well as winning the EMC Data Hero Award.

Second year students Tess Casasin Sheridan and Aoife Doherty received the Geological Survey of Ireland Award for their project while David Sims was Highly Commended for his project.

“This is Stephen’s third year in the exhibition and they all have been building in the same area. His father and his uncle are both fishermen so that is what Stephen knows best. It is a great advantage to have a project that the student has an interest in and has a lot of knowledge around,” said John Sims of Mary Immaculate Secondary School.

“Keelan and Rhianna did very well as well, coming second in their category and also winning the EMC Data Hero Award. This award is for data analysis and they had 20,000 lines of data in their project which was a great achievement.

“The standard was so high this year and I think everyone did really really well. It was above my wildest dreams that everyone did so well. It was a great achievement.”

ONE hundred per cent of the € 23.76 million requested by Clare County Council from central government must be forthcoming and soon if the local authority is to begin restoring the storm ravaged county. That was the message from county councillors at a special meeting on Friday, during which warnings were issued that lives will be lost if the infrastructure is not repaired immediately.

Cllr Richard Nagle (FF) said that one such urgent case was the main thoroughfare to the tourist attraction – the Cliffs of Moher.

“If something isn’t done at that location and other locations highlighted in this report, what is going to happen? Is it that that road will simply collapse and it is very close to that now? And if the road collapses, without ever talking about loss of life, it is going to result in a huge loss to the local economy, the main way to the cliffs will be collapsed and it will cost millions then. Whatever it is going to cost now that the road it there it will cost a lot more to be rebuild,” said the North Clare councillor.

He added however that priority must be given to people displaced by the storm and sea swells.

“We need a swift response from central government and a swift allocation of funds to start this work as a matter of urgency,” he said.

Cllr Michael Hillery (FF) was not confident that the close on € 24 million will cover the cost of the “damage I have seen along the coast line”.

Senior engineer with Clare County Council Tom Tiernan said the coun- cil will be working hard to restore local authority infrastructure.

He said the council’s focus would also be in making serous inroads into the village of Kilbaha in the coming weeks and Clahane north of Liscan nor “where serious damage has been done and a number of other areas where access is seriously curtailed”.

“We are a long way from having Lahinch ready for what is needed for the tourist season, but we will achieve it. This is something that is obviously very important to the county during the tourist season.”

THERE have been calls to remove beggars from the streets of Ennis after concern was raised that women are being “trafficked” into the town to beg.

Cllr Paul O’Shea (Ind) has requested the council “work with appropriate authorities such as social welfare inspectors to ascertain if those who continue to beg on the streets of Ennis are in receipt of social welfare payments”.

He called on the council to endeavour to make Ennis a begging free zone n 2014 so as to encourage tourism in the town.

At the council’s January meeting, town clerk Leonard Cleary said the issue of begging was recently discussed at the Ennis Joint Policing Committee on December 16.

He stated, “Ennis Town Council will work with the Gardaí and other agencies in relation to this matter. In addition the JPC discussed the importance of balancing support for local charities with national charity collections visiting Ennis. Again, the council will liaise with the relevant agencies.”

Cllr O’Shea told the meeting he had seen the same people begging on the streets of Clonmel and Ennis.

Cllr Johnny Flynn (FG) said women are “rotated” in and out of the Ennis area. He said some of the women are often forced into “other activities”. Cllr Flynn told the meeting there were reports locally that the women are dropped into Ennis by a man driving a Mercedes car.

“There is abuse of women and children in this,” he added. Cllr Mary Howard (FG) said gardaí believe women are being “trafficked” into Ireland for the purposes of begging. She also criticised the activities of some charity collectors or “chuggers”.

Cllr Howard said some of those collecting money around Dunnes Stores and the Post Office can be “intimidating and abusive”.