Extensive restoration work to the Pollathomas/Glengad/Inver area of Erris, Co Mayo, following a major landslide in 2003, is now fully completed. Tom Shielreports.
Minister for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs Éamon Ó Cuív attended a ceremony yesterday to commemorate the incident, which directly affected 50 local families. It was held in the Church of Christ the King, Aughoose, followed by a blessing at Pollathomas Cemetery.
The sudden rainstorm on the night of September 13th, 2003, washed 200,000 cubic metres of debris off Dooncarton Mountain and sent it sluicing through the graveyard into Longstream Bay.
Although no lives were lost, houses, roads and bridges were destroyed and extensive damage was caused to the burial ground, which took a long time to repair. Some human remains were washed out to sea and never recovered.
Fr Sean Noone, the curate in Cornboy/Carratigue, made a note in his diary of the downpour, which continued for about three hours with a "horrifying sound". He read part of his diary entry at yesterday's commemoration Mass. "It was not rain as we know it but a volume of water from the skies like as if you threw a bucket of water with the wind."
Out of the calamity of devastation had emerged a stronger community, Fr Noone said, his words echoing later comments by Mr Ó Cuív and the cathaoirleach of Mayo County Council, Cllr Gerry Coyle.
Mr Ó Cuív praised Dooncarton Landslide Committee, working in conjunction with Mayo County Council and the Office of Public Works, for what it had achieved.
Dignitaries who attended yesterday's ceremonies included Mayo county manager Des Mahon and a number of his officials, and the chief superintendent of the Garda Síochána in Mayo, Tony McNamara.