Regional

FIRE crews from Ennis, Scariff and Kilrush had to be drafted in by Clare County Council to augment the water supply for more than 30,000 consumers last weekend, following failures at the new €9.8 million Ennis Water Treatment Plant.

Two newlyweds aiming to break the world record for the most married couple in six months took to North Clare last weekend, where they added another four vow renewals to their total tally. Mark and Denise Duffield-Thomas, from the UK and Australia, were the winners of the Ultimate Job in Ireland, which saw them land the ultimate dream job in May 2010. It had a top prize of six months of luxury travel around the globe, checking out the best places in the world to get married and to honeymoon in.Since they started their job, Mark and Denise have been to the US, Kenya, Jordan, Zanzibar, Mauritius, Malta, Spain, London and travelled extensively across Ireland. They’ll conclude their task in November with the last trip to Denise’s home country, Australia. The couple took on an additional challenge as part of their prize and are currently working towards breaking the Guinness World Record for most married couple. To achieve this, they …

KILRUSH has been awarded a gold medal in Category D of the annual National Tidy Towns Competition. The award was announced by Environment Minister John Gormley in Dublin on Monday.Kilrush scored 300 points, which was an increase of two points on last year’s result, to beat off competition from all over Ireland and claim the accolade. The maximum total achievable is 400 points. The town first received its gold medal award in 2007 and since then has been gradually increasing its marks year on year.Category D is for towns of between 2,501 and 5,000 people.For the first time, St Senan’s Primary School in Kilrush also won a special schools award for the Mid-West region for their role in working with the local tidy towns committee.“Retaining the gold medal is a massive achievement for everybody involved, as at this level the competition gets more difficult,” Murt Collins, chairman of Kilrush Tidy Towns Committee said.He added that the award marks the culmination …

DEFENCE Minister Tony Killeen has been asked to intervene in the possible transfer of staff, mainly nurses, from Ennis hospital to tackle staffing shortages at the Mid-Western Regional Hospital, Limerick.

THE Ennis National School new building project at Ashline, on a greenfield site donated by the Killaloe diocese, is once again progressing apace.

Two East Clare villages have stood out as this year’s Tidy Towns results were announced, with prizes going to Mountshannon and Tuamgraney, while three other villages have come up in the ranks on their previous performances.

The inaugural Mountshannon traditional music weekend kicks off next Friday to Sunday September 24-26 in conjunction with the Mountshannon Hotel and is organised by Cliodhna Donnellan.

As a young bride, Eileen Kane went on a quest to find out why the downtrodden Native American Paiutes love coyotes and why the disadvantaged Youngstown mill families vote for the Mafia. Now, at 70, the South Galway resident has published her first book, an entertaining anthropological memoir, Trickster. The book recounts Eileen’s experience in 1964 when she returned from her honeymoon and without husband Francis made her way to Nevada and a Paiute Reservation to learn how to be an anthropologist. “This book should give hope to every aspiring writer,” Eileen says, “because it’s the most unlikely subject imaginable. It happened 46 years ago and yet the first publisher I sent it to accepted it.” It was Frank McCourt who encouraged her to write. She saw him standing alone on the steps of the old Great Southern Hotel a few years ago and decided to congratulate him on his success. He asked if she wanted to write too and …