Shannon

PLANNING permission has been granted to St Patrick’s Comprehensive School, Shannon for a major extension. The extension is to be two storeys in size, with a gross floor area of 2,616m2. It is to accommodate a special needs unit, general purpose area, engineering room, lecture room, art room, science laboratory, music room, home economics room, multimedia room and business/computers room, while there will other site works, including a new site entrance, car parking and set-down areas, as well as a hard court and hurling wall area. Clare County Council had sought additional information regarding a number of aspects of the development, including the drop-off areas, road safety, flood risk and the removal of trees. The applicants submitted the additional information sought and the planning authorities expressed satisfaction with the replies. With regard to the removal of the trees, the planning report states, “The existing tree line is to be removed as part of the improved traffic management arrangements to accommodate …

ELEMENT Six are taking on another 40 staff in Shannon and say that there is likely to be scope for further growth due to a €25 million capital investment and the relocation of €20 million of assets to the Shannon plant. Five years ago the company announced redundancies and the overall number of Shannon employees dropped to 250. However it has since rebounded to around 360 and is now set to hit 400. Walter Huhn, Chief Executive of Element Six, was in Shannon on Wednesday and he said that the painful cost cutting measures introduced in Shannon have secured the future of the plant, and led to a situation where it is now expanding again. “We started the restructuring in Shannon five years ago with a very clear focus on what we wanted to achieve, what we had to achieve because the global market was changing and the competitive environment was changing. We had to be even more of a …

 Christmas came early for a Ryanair passenger and his family today as Michael O’Leary turned up in person to congratulate them for becoming the airline’s 13th million passenger at Shannon Airport.    The Ryanair CEO surprised Piotr Rachuta, who was travelling back to Poland on the Shannon-Wroclaw flight with his wife Marta and 4year old daughter Amelia, by announcing him on the airport tannoy as the lucky 13th million passenger. “I didn’t expect this today when I came to Shannon Airport for sure.  I am very surprised and very happy,” a beaming Mr Rachuta said after he was approached by Mr O’Leary and presented with a free return Ryanair flight and overnight accommodation for his family.  http://youtu.be/_Jgz96EYI8Y

MICHAEL O’Leary was once known for his scathing attacks on government, but he was singing a different song at Shannon on Monday, at one point saying he’d be worried about a change of administration. Michael Noonan sat beside him at the airport on Monday, and his sense of self worth must have been soaring as O’Leary doled out the love for the Finance Minister. “As someone who is frequently critical of politicians and often quoted as being critical of politicians when they don’t do something intelligent, today is one of those opportunities, rare enough in Ireland where you get the chance to credit politicians when they do something sensible. One of the worst decisions undertaken by the previous Government of this country was at a time of financial crisis to impose a tax on visitors to a peripheral island. The travel tax had a devastating impact on air traffic and tourism in this country. We have lobbied long and hard …

STOBART Air has announced that it will end its Shannon based services from January 5. The airline currently operates routes to Bristol, Birmingham and Edinburgh. While it had been known that Stobart was closing its Shannon base there had been hopes that it would continue operating services to the Clare airport, even though aircraft or staff wouldn’t be based there. Some weeks ago the Shannon staff had been offered the option of a transfer or redundancy. Stobart Air has said that passengers with bookings for flights post January 5 will be contacted by the airline in the coming days and will be rebooked on Aer Lingus flights from other airports or given a full refund. A spokesperson for Stobart Air said, “This is a regrettable decision and not one taken lightly. Shannon does not fit with our current strategic plan, and we have to make the right long term choices for the airline. “We regret any adverse impact this may …

ENDA Kenny is to face protests when he comes to Clare on Monday, with the revised water charges still the subject of much public anger. Gardaí met earlier this week to make plans for Monday, when the Taoiseach is set to visit TTM Healthcare at Ballymaley, speak at the Shannon Chamber president’s lunch in Dromoland and open Genworth’s new business centre in Shannon. There is speculation that jobs will be announced at TTM Healthcare and while there were reports that new jobs would also be announced at Genworth, a company spokesman told The Clare Champion this is not the case. It is understood that another Shannon company, which is due to take on new staff in 2015, are also hopeful that the Taoiseach will visit them. At a so-called street meeting in Shannon on Tuesday night, representatives of the We Won’t Pay anti-water charges campaign said they have plans to protest when the Taoiseach is in Clare. They also said …

Shannon Airport’s strong momentum across 2014 has continued into the final month of the autumn, with passenger numbers for October showing a 28% increase on the same period twelve months ago. The biggest gains in passengers through the terminal were again on European services, which were up by 63% on the same period 12 months ago thanks to a range of nine attractive new routes that were launched for the summer season (April through to end of October). Eight of those were on the European market, which resulted in a 111% increase (from 20,347 to 42,950) in passengers to and from the continent last month compared to October 2013. Transatlantic passengers were up by 15% (from 23,511 to 27,108) thanks to the increased frequency across New York and Boston services this year, with Shannon’s biggest market, the UK, up by 6% (from 61,681 to 65,243). Welcoming the growth, Airport CEO Neil Pakey said, “It’s been a really great summer season …

RehabCare in Shannon recently  highly commended in the Rehab Group Innovation Awards 2014 at an award ceremony in Dublin for its ‘What’s Good For Your Head?’ project. This project won the award in the ‘Health and Social Care Innovation’ category and was selected as a highly commended out of 64 innovative projects, which had been submitted from across the organisation. ‘What’s Good For Your Head?’ was set up to promote positive mental health in the community. Eight people with experience of mental health difficulties worked with a quality and planning co-ordinator in RehabCare to develop a project and booklet on positive mental health and wellbeing. The project examined what mental health is, looked at ways to recognise mental health difficulty and also provided some self-management practices. The booklet contains all of this information as well providing information on local support services. Jessica Curtis, Community Services Manager from RehabCare said, “The Rehab Group Innovation Awards reward examples of best practice, improvement …