An electronics firm has announced that 178 jobs will be cut from its Shannon office.
Staff at Tyco Electronics were told this morning that the world's largest electronic components maker intends to transfer operations from Shannon to India, China and Mexico.
The transfer would be completed by September 2009, the company said.
The mayor of Clare, Patricia McCarthy, and mayor of Shannon Sean McLoughlin said it was the fourth such announcement to be made by a local manufacturing firm in recent weeks.
Ms McCarthy said it should serve as reminder to the Government that any failure to retain services between the airports could result in further significant job losses.
Chipmaker Intel, which also has a facility in Shannon, announced 200 Irish job losses last week, while 260 jobs were lost at Analog Devices in Limerick, Rothenberger Ireland and Mohawk Europa in Shannon last month.
The potential loss of direct access from Shannon airport to Heathrow had heightened fears that other multinationals could follow suit, Ms McCarthy said. "Business, community and political leaders across the region fear that the recent manufacturing job losses could mark the beginning of a haemorrhaging of the sector in the midwest."
Today's announcement by Tyco coincides with the first full Government debate on the Shannon-Heathrow issue.
It is understood that 20 jobs in research & development will remain in Shannon, but the loss of nearly 200 jobs was devastating, Fine Gael Clare TD Pat Breen said.
"The fact that these jobs are going overseas to the cheaper economies of India, China and Mexico is confirmation that Ireland's competitiveness is still in decline, hitting Irish manufacturing and causing job losses."
Mr Breen said Ireland had lost a 30,000 manufacturing jobs in the last five years.
"Tyco Electronics is a global operation with facilities around the world, and it specifically chose Shannon for the Free Zone and its international air links. The loss of the Heathrow flights from Shannon will make it even harder to attract replacement jobs to the region," he added.