Tag Archives: Paris

A flight from Paris to Chicago diverted  to Shannon Airport on Sunday evening, when an unclaimed mobile phone was found on board. The flight diverted to Shannon and remained there for two hours. It is believed that the phone was left on the aeroplane following a previous flight. The Paris-Chicago flight subsequently left for the US at 7pm on Sunday evening.

Millions of French commuters are seeing ads for Ireland as they pass through the busy metro stations of Paris this month. Tourism Ireland in Paris has teamed up with French airline Transavia (the low cost airline owned by the Air France-KLM group) to highlight holidays and short breaks in Ireland for 2018. The campaign with Transavia includes ads on almost 500 screens in metro stations around the French capital, highlighting great value fares to Dublin from Paris, which are grabbing the attention of commuters with a beautiful image of the Cliffs of Moher – and reminding them why they should put Ireland on their holiday wish-list for 2018. The campaign also includes a strong push on social channels, including Facebook and Instagram. France is one of the top four markets for tourism to the island of Ireland and 2017 was the fifth record-breaking year in a row for French visitors to Ireland.

The Embassy of Ireland in Paris was the venue for a recent B2B tourism event, Irlande à Paris. Organised by Tourism Ireland, the networking event involved some 70 leading French group travel operators meeting, and doing business with, 18 Irish tourism companies, including Shannon Heritage. Monica MacLaverty, Tourism Ireland’s manager of Southern Europe, said, “We are delighted that so many key decision-makers from the group travel sector in France took the time to meet with our tourism partners from Ireland, to hear about our fantastic tourism offering and the many opportunities for group travel to County Clare and the West of Ireland.” France is one of the top four markets for tourism to the island of Ireland and 2016 was the fourth record-breaking year in a row for French visitors to Ireland. Last year was the best year ever for tourism from France to the island of Ireland, when with more than 500,000 French visitors.

The family of rugby legend Anthony Foley has responded to the outpouring of support and sympathy received since his sudden death in Paris over the weekend. “With Anthony’s passing, we have ultimately lost an amazing, adoring and loving father and husband; an equally caring, loyal and devoted son and brother; a central and go-to figure for the wider Foley and Hogan families. Our anguish at the sudden loss of Anthony is bottomless. We have been plunged deep into an incomprehensible darkness and sense of loss that we must work our way through over the coming days, weeks, months and years. “We know, too, that his sudden death has brought the rugby worlds of Shannon RFC, Munster, Ireland and much further afield crashing down. You have lost a former player, coach, friend and all-round inspiration – your and our hero both. We mourn his loss together,” the family said in a statement. In recognising the sympathetic may in which the media …

THE Cliffs of Moher features in an innovative Tourism Ireland Euro 2016 promotion, to capitalise on the tourism potential of the tournament. Celebrating the historic and remarkable achievement that both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland teams have qualified for the tournament, Tourism Ireland has created a new online film – bringing the beautiful game together with some of the most beautiful places on the island of Ireland. The video features two freestyle footballers – Jamie Knight in Northern Ireland and Dara Coyne in the Republic of Ireland – playing ball at some of our top visitor attractions, including O’Brien’s Tower and the Cliffs of Moher. The campaign will be rolled out on Facebook and YouTube in seven markets, including France, Germany, Britain, Italy, Spain, Sweden and Canada, leveraging devotion to football in those countries. The film will also be promoted worldwide on Ireland.com (16.6 million visits in 2016) and via Tourism Ireland’s social media platforms – with its Facebook fans (about 3.6 million fans), Twitter followers (346,000), and on its YouTubechannel. …

FRENCH Ambassador to Ireland, Mr Jean-Pierre Thébault, will visit Kilmaley National School on Monday morning to pay tribute to the school’s 127 pupils for their butterfly condolence card sent to the French embassy, following the recent terrorist attacks in Paris. School principal Leonard McNamara told The Clare Champion the children wanted to somehow extend the hand of friendship to the French people following the attacks, in which 129 people died. “We have roughly the same number of children in the school as the number of people that were murdered in Paris. The children each created their own butterfly to represent each person who died in the tragedy. We made a large card, depicting the map of France,” Mr McNamara explained. “The children represented France in the French colours in crepe paper, like a large butterfly, with the River Seine coming out from the butterfly. The children had all of the other butterflies mounted onto the card. It was as if you …

Since the terrorist attacks in Paris on Friday evening, which have claimed the lives of 129 people, An Garda Síochána have been in close contact with French and other close security partners to assess any implications for Ireland. In a statement issued today (Monday),  it was outlined there is a Garda Liaison Officer attached to the Irish Embassy in Paris who has direct contact with the French authorities. “Since these events, An Garda Síochána has conducted an intelligence assessment review and on Saturday the Commissioner briefed the National Security Committee and the Minister for Justice and Equality of our threat assessment. As indicated by the Minister for Justice & Equality yesterday, the threat level in this jurisdiction remains unchanged and the threat environment in this jurisdiction at the moment can be described as one where “an attack is possible but not likely”. Notwithstanding the current threat assessment, An Garda Síochána will keep under review the ongoing issues in France and elsewhere …

RADICAL British Muslim cleric Anjem Choudary has said Ireland is now seen as a legitimate target for attacks by certain terror groups due to the American use of Shannon. Mr Choudary was a founder member of the organisation al-Muhajiroun, which was subsequently banned in Britain under anti terrorist legislation. He is a strong proponet of Sharia law and has been vocal in his support of those who carried out the 9/11 attacks. On Cork radio station Red FM this morning he spoke about the situation in France, and when asked about whether people at Shannon Airport and other strategic parts of the country should be concerned about attacks he said, “I think people should always be concerned because there is a war taking place, that war is a global war taking place on every level.” Asked if Al Qaeda and other radicals now see Ireland as a legitimate target because of the use of Shannon he replied. “It’s not (just) now that …