Headlines below - click on date for details. For earlier news and comment, click here.
Page last updated: 08 March 1999 08:12
February 24: Newsweek magazine is
carrying a feature on Flight 712 in the March 1 issue. Written by Bonnie Ganglehoff, it
raises the issue of the crash in an international perspective and asks what really
happened in the 1968 crash that killed her parents. Full text now available - click here.
February 23: In other news: Brian O'Shea TD has recently raised a number of questions in Dail Eireann ( The Irish Parliament ) on Flight 712 and full information will be available shortly. Aer Lingus have also renovated the Crosstown, Co. Wexford grave site where some of the victims are interred. This follows on from a request made by the relatives late last year.
February 6: Investigators confirm that the recent trawler find of a metal object from an as yet un-identified aircraft, 20 miles south of Tuskar Rock has 'nothing to do with the Tuskar Rock accident'
February 4: Witnesses to the Tuskar Rock air crash and salvage operation are to be interviewed again as part of a joint British-Irish review of documentation relating to the tragedy.
January 30: An aircraft part has been recovered from the seabed, 20 miles south of Tuskar Rock by a Kilmore Quay based trawler. Department of Transport has taken possesion of it pending an official investigation. John Coughlan, brother of Anne Coughlan, Hostess on Flight 712, recalls the events of 1968 in the Nationalist and Munster Advertiser.
January 29: The Phoenix Magazine suggests that the current air accident investigators should forget the official records and instead concentrate on the MATS records held in RAF Bishopscourt in Co. Down - The Phoenix also asks what many have suspected for some time, could Flight 712 have been brought down with a 'Sidewinder' missile?
January 25: Public Enterprise Minister O'Rourke met with British Transport Minister Glenda Jackson in London to determine dates for the Irish and British air accident investigators to begin a series of meetings. A time frame for the meetings was announced, begining with Wednesday January 27th. This meeting will include both Irish and British air accident investigators plus Ministry of Defence officials.
London Times announced former Chairman and Managing Director of Vickers died January 7.
January 19: Confirmed: A British file on the Tuskar crash was shredded in 1994 according to British Junior Transport Minister, Glenda Jackson. Irish Government requests that Aer Lingus produce it's official report made on the Flight712 crash draws a blank. The airline claims that no report was tabled. Ms O'Rourke, Minister for Public Enterprise says the report 'vanished' and that she 'Can't believe it'. Also revelations that aircraft parts salvaged by the Irish Navy with 'marks' were handed over to the Royal Navy.
January 17: Opposition Spokesman on Public Enterprise demands release of the Tuskar Rock Flight documents - was the aircraft one of every ten produced by Vickers to crash? Any truth to allegations that corporate interest resulted in the non-disclosure of the Aer Lingus investigation report?
January 16: British Ambassador to Ireland, Dame Veronica Sutherland's last interview - states her involvement in the affair now is motivated by humanitarianism, a wish to help the relatives of the 61 people who died. ``We really do not think we have anything to hide...It is very easy to make all kinds of speculation about what might have happened but it is very difficult to disprove the speculation.' Expresses concern that the renewed interest has sparked anti-British feeling.
January 15: Will the fresh review of circumstances surrounding the crash have the capacity to uncover the truth? Calls for British Defency Ministry workers and Army personnel to be allowed tell what they know.
January 13: Joint study of Tuskar crash papers planned following meeting between the British ambassador, Dame Veronica Sutherland, and Minister for Public Enterprise, Ms O'Rourke. Renewed public interest in the tragedy has grown following the 30th anniversary of the crash of the St Phelim. Controversial claims have been made that British missile tests led to the downing of the Aer Lingus aircraft.
January 12: Irish & British Investigators to re-examine evidence of disaster....British say their missiles in 1968 did not have the range to hit the aircraft...Revealed - British cabinet papers relating to the missile test site in Wales were extracted from official files and destroyed in 1982.
January 11: Revelations that a British Army unit was conducting missile tests in Wales on March 24th 1968. An 'Open Secret' amongst Territorial Army members that a fired missile went off course and believed to have downed Flight 712. Calls for Taoiseach Ahern to raise the issue with British P.M. Blair and for any British military personnel to be allowed give evidence. The Guardian Newspaper published in the UK also reports on the case.
January 8: Irish Government ministers pledged to pursue the truth behind the Tuskar Rock plane crash as British officials 'vowed to rebut line by line' a document alleging a cover up. Minister for Sate at the Department of the Marine, Hugh Byrne said 'Whatever it takes, the facts must be established and people should come clean.' The Irish Times reports that the Minister for Public Enterprise, Ministry of Defence has referred a document alleging a British cover-up of the 1968 Tuskar air disaster to the investigation section of the air navigation unit within her Department.
January 7: Mary O'Rourke 'may soon banish the secrecy which has hung over Ireland's worst air disaster for 30 years..'
Former Managing Director and Chairman of Vickers ( 1962-67 ), Maj.Gen Sir Charles Dunphie dies aged 96
January 6: Minister for Public Enterprise, Mrs O'Rourke is to meet with the British Ambassador on the Tuskar Rock air disaster.
Sea Find Not From Tuskar
A metal object from an aircraft found twenty miles south of Tuskar Rock does not appear to be connected with the Aer Lingus crash of 1968. Initial investigations suggested the circular object, was part of an aircraft engine. However the air accident investigation unit now believes it has nothing to do with the Tuskar Rock accident.
Irish Independent
Tuskar Rock plane crash witnesses are
to be interviewed again
WITNESSES to the Tuskar Rock air crash and salvage operation are being interviewed again
as part of a joint British-Irish review of documentation relating to the tragedy.
An official from the Department of Public Enterprise has already visited a former Irish
naval commander to review reports he made of British interference in the salvage of debris
from the Aer Lingus Viscount which crashed mysteriously off the Co Wexford coast in 1968,
killing 61 people. Investigators will also be visiting Wexford in the coming weeks to talk
to local people who gave evidence to the official inquiry at the time.
The moves follow quickly on a meeting between Department of Defence officials and air
accident investigators from Britain and Ireland in Dublin, yesterday week. The meeting was
held as part of a commitment by both Public Enterprise Minister Mary O'Rourke and British
Transport Minister Glenda Jackson to form a committee to jointly review all materials held
in the two countries. A second meeting was held at the same time between Mrs O'Rourke and
the Tuskar Rock Relatives Committee who said, yesterday, they were very pleased with the
speed at which the review had got underway.
"We feel very positive towards the effort the Minister says she is willing to put
into this and the co-operation she seems willing to give us. It gives us hope that we
might get somewhere with this review," said relatives' spokeswoman Celine O'Donoghue.
She said the relatives had requested they be allowed have a representative on the joint
review committee and Mrs O'Rourke had agreed to consider their proposal.
It also emerged, yesterday, that the true identity of a piece of gearbox found by a
trawler 30 miles from Tuskar Rock last week should be known within days. Experts are
examining the item, which had been submerged for a considerable time, but while Ms
O'Donoghue said the relatives knew it was unlikely to be part of the Viscount, they wanted
the examination to go further than simply ruling out that possibility.
The theory that the plane was struck by a British missile or an unmanned target drone
plane has refused to die since the crash.
Cork Examiner
Object found in sea handed to air crash investigators
The Department of Transport has taken possession of an object, thought to be an aircraft part, which was found by fishermen recently near Tuskar Rock, the scene of the unexplained Viscount air tragedy.
The shell-encrusted object, apparently part of an aluminium engine or gear mechanism, was recovered from the sea by crew members of the Kilmore Quay trawler Angelina B. It was brought ashore on Wednesday night.
The skipper of the trawler, Mr Dermot Bates, said that the object had been taken into a net about 20 miles south of Tuskar Rock.
"What made us think it was an aircraft part is that it was made of aluminium. You would rarely see a marine engine made of aluminium", Mr Bates said. He added that the object was cylindrical and measured between three and four feet in length and about 18 inches in width.
The Aer Lingus Viscount crashed off the coast of Wexford on March 24th, 1968. The cause of the crash, in which 61 people died, has not been established.
The trawler owner, Mr James Bates, contacted the Department of the Marine about the discovery of the object. The Department alerted the gardaí in Kilmore Quay, who took possession of it.
A Department of Transport inspector travelled to Kilmore Quay on Thursday and placed the object in secure storage. A courier yesterday transported it to Dublin.
Garda Jim O'Sullivan, who had responsibility for the object while it was in Kilmore Quay Garda station, said there was no way of knowing if it was connected to the Tuskar Rock tragedy.
The find came in the same week that Mr Ivan Yates, Fine Gael TD for Wexford, called on the Government to offer a six-figure reward for information leading to the truth about the cause of the crash.
Irish Times
Air Disaster Familes Demand Answers
A Tipperary man whose sister died in the Tuskar Rock air disaster has appealed to officials leading a new British/Irish probe into the crash to find some answers to the thirty one year old mystery.
John Coughlan’s twenty one year old sister Mary, an air hostess on the ill fated Flight 712 from Cork to London on Sunday March 24th 1968, died along with sixty other in the tragedy.
This week John welcomed the setting up of a review of the case set in train by Minister for Public Enterprise Mary O’Rourke and the British Junior Minister for Transport, Glenda Jackson in London on Monday.
However, he expressed disappointment that the new examination of the disaster fell short of the full inquiry being sought by the families of the victims.
“At least its a start. Hopefully it will shed some light on the disaster. There are so many questions. Families of the people who died need answers. We want an explanation. We want to know what really happened that day”, said John Coughlan who lives in Avondale Crescent in Tipperary town.
Mary, who had accepted her wings just a month before the air disaster, was the only daughter of Billy and Margaret Coughlan of Ballykisteen. Both her parents, who had to endure the heartbreak of never finding their daughter, died without ever knowing how the disaster happened.
Now John and his three brothers are hoping that the answers to all their questions and the huge mystery surrounding the Aer Lingus Viscount plane crash near Tuskar Rock will be resolved in the near future.
The mystery surrounding the tragedy is something that has greatly troubled John Coughlan from the Sunday he was out shooting rabbits thirty one years ago. A neighbour ran through the fields looking for him to tell him that an Aer Lingus plane had gone down and his sister could be on the flight.
“I remember that day as if it was last Sunday. I was in a total state of shock. It’s always there in your mind. It does not go away. Because Mary was one of the forty seven people on the plane that were never found, her mother always expected her to walk in the front door. People talk about the Tuskar disaster at times like the 30th anniversary last year and now because of the new developments but for us it’s there every day”, he added.
“Why has it taken thirty one years for this development. Mary died thirty one years ago and none of the family have any explanation for it. In air disasters or recent years people have an explanation almost instantly. Who was responsible for it and how did it happen?” asked John’s wife Margaret.
All the explanations for air disasters like Lockerbie and the Boeing disaster off New York have been studied in detail by John. He believes the new probe will be a help and he hoped it would bring the whole debate about Tuskar out in the open.
“There are so many stories and so many theories being floated about how it could have happened. The answer had to lie somewhere”, he added.
Families of the victims he said wanted to know what really happened. Was it simply down to a fault in the plane or had it anything to do with the British Military? He, like all the other families, wanted to know had it anything to do with the British military missile range at Aberport in Wales. Was a missile from that range responsible for the crash? Did a missile strike the plane which was intended for a British military dummy plane used for missile target practice? Did the St. Phelim crash with a British Military dummy plane? That range could have been closed that weekend but if it was why were a number of British naval ships in the area whose purpose was to clear up any of the debris from the target practice. Why did the log of one of those ships for a period of four days go missing? Why were the stories of civilians who saw something that Sunday morning along the coastline of Wexford discounted? With all the British navy ships searching for the wreckage why did it take three months for the wreckage to be found by a trawler hired by the Irish Government?
“Nobody had ever given the families explanations for those questions. All of the mystery and conflict needs to be cleared up. Like all the other families I would like a full inquiry but what we are getting at this stage is better than nothing”, said John.
He pointed out that all the families who met last year at the 30th anniversary Mass in Cork were very frustrated by the long delay in setting up an inquiry. He often spoke to a relative of the pilot of the plane who lives in nearby Lattin and everybody involved wanted the whole issue to be cleared up as quickly as possible.
John remembers that Mary’s path to Aer Lingus started two years prior to the tragedy. Mary, a striking and elegant young woman, won the “Pride of Tipperary” title in 1966. She was crowned by the then Mayor Limerick who suggested a career in Shannon. Mary initially worked in the duty free area before accepting her wings as an air hostess one month before she was killed.
“Everybody was thrilled for Mary. She wanted to become an air hostess and she was delighted embarking on her new career. Mary should not have been on the St. Phelim flight that day. She had switched flight with another air hostess”, said her brother.
Thirty one years on the pain and anguish felt by her family has not diminished. Pictures of Mary take pride of place in the Coughlan living room - pictures of John’s sister being crowned Pride of Tipperary and in her Aer Lingus uniform the day she was given her wings. Beside the pictures stand the huge trophy Mary won when crowned Pride of Tipperary.
The Nationalist and Munster Advertiser.
The Tuskar Rock File
Mary O'Rourke's recent efforts to find out what happened the Aer Lingus Viscount downed near Tuskar Rock in 1967 ( sic ) are to be applauded. But she is wasting her time having existing contemporary files re-opened.
Any search should start in the records of the MATS ( Military Air Traffic Service ) base known as Ulster Radar. Located at RAF Bishopscourt on Killard Point, Co. Down, it supervised all air movement in British defensive 'controlled airspace' from Cape Wrath in Scotland to Land's End and out as far as ten degrees west in the Atlantic as part of a NATO project codenamed BOXER.
No civilian or military aircraft - not even a hot air balloon - flew over the Irish Sea without the approval of the Duty Master Controller at Killard, near Ardglass. Meticulous records were kept at the hush-hush base of all air movements, especially the score of daily sorties to war practice ranges at West Fraugh, Jurby and Spadedam.
At the time the Aer Lingus plane from Cork to London was downed, the Irish Sea was a cauldron of Cold War activity - with NATO planes crossing civilian air lanes seven days a week. Most carried Sidewinder heat seaking missiles. Although their explosive warheads were normally unarmed on training flights, air velocity would inevitably have caused a crash if they 'homed in' on another aircraft.
There is a history of Sidewinders being accidentally discharged in simulated combat conditions and in one publicised case, a Sidewinder flew 50 miles in the opposite direction from which it had been aimed. A similiar missile fired by a US jet brought down an Italian airliner over the Mediteranean in an incident remarkably like the Aer Lingus disaster. Click here for our coverage on this case.
Such a scenario was not considered by the Irish investigators probing the crash because they were unaware at that time of these hush hush activities. Understandably, the British kept silent. Any publicity would have revealed information about the Spadeadam training programme - codenamed RED FLAG and about the BOXER air defence system controlled from Killard.
The Phoenix Magazine. January 29, 1999. p4.
Investigators to examine Tuskar Rock evidence
Irish Times 26 January 1999
British and Irish air accident investigators and officials from the British Ministry of Defence will meet in Dublin tomorrow to begin re-examining evidence relating to the 1968 Tuskar Rock air crash in which 61 people were killed.
The formal arrangements for the review of existing documents were discussed at a meeting in London yesterday between the Minister for Public Enterprise, Ms O'Rourke, and Britain's junior transport minister, Ms Glenda Jackson. The review will take place during a series of meetings in Dublin and London and is expected to last three to four months. British and Irish officials will decide tomorrow the number and location of meetings and will report to each minister at intervals during the review.
Speculation about the cause of the crash has increased since the 30th anniversary of the disaster and the publication of a document earlier this month claiming a British missile hit the aircraft. The British Ministry of Defence has described other theories, including the existence of a drone target aircraft and the cremation of victims, as "absolute and complete rubbish".
Ms O'Rourke will meet relatives of the victims later this week to discuss the review. Talking to RTÉ after the meeting, she said: "It is not a new inquiry, it is a much more focused review of all the available evidence. It is owed to all the relatives to conduct a sharper review of all the evidence."
She said she believed the British authorities were co-operating fully with the review and she was keeping an "absolutely open mind" about the cause of the crash. "There is a strong sense of such compassion and emotion by people who don't know what happened . . . we must do everything we can to clear up the questions still shrouding Tuskar Rock." Ms O'Rourke also appealed for anyone with information about the crash to come forward.
A spokeswoman for the British Department of Environment, Transport and the Regions said officials from the British Air Accident and Investigation Branch (AAIB) and the Ministry of Defence would review all the available evidence relating to the "tragedy" of the Tuskar air crash.
Ms O'Rourke also discussed with Ms Jackson the provision of disability access on public transport in Britain and Ireland and after the meeting she travelled on a London bus fitted with specially designed access platforms for the disabled. A pilot scheme being launched in Dublin in two months by Dublin Bus will see up to six buses with facilities for the disabled on busy routes and representatives of disabled groups will be invited to take part in the trial and report on its merits.
Meeting clears way for review of Tuskar crashCork Examiner 26 January 1999
THE search for new clues to the Tuskar Rock air disaster begins tomorrow, when
officials from Britain and Ireland meet in Dublin to begin reviewing documentation held by
both countries.
The move follows a meeting between Minister for Public Enterprise, Mary O'Rourke, and the
British Junior Minister for Transport, Glenda Jackson, in London yesterday. Tomorrow's
meeting, which will be attended by officials of both Ministers, accident investigators
from the two countries and the British Ministry of Defence, will be used to map out a
schedule for the review, which is expected to take 3-4 months to complete. A spokesman for
Minister O'Rourke said she was keen to get the review under way as quickly as possible.
She announced the initiative following a meeting with the outgoing British Ambassador to
Ireland, Veronica Sutherland, two weeks ago.
"Minister Jackson was very willing and helpful in the
matter and extremely concerned about the relatives involved in the tragedy," the
spokesman said.
Minister O'Rourke has also arranged to meet representatives of the relatives tomorrow.
The meeting was arranged late last year, when she asked them to outline specific questions
and areas of concern they wanted addressed.
Calls for a fresh enquiry into the air crash, which resulted in the death of 61 people in
March 1968, have been made repeatedly over the years. However, the plea has strengthened
since last year, the 30th anniversary of the tragedy.
An official investigation at the time of the accident failed to explain why the Aer Lingus
Viscount plane went down without warning near Tuskar Rock off the Wexford coast while on a
flight from Cork to London. A theory that it was hit by a British missile during a
training exercise has refused to dissipate.
Material held by various government departments in both countries is to be reviewed in the
coming months, although it has been acknowledged the British files are incomplete, as some
documents were destroyed in routine shredding as recently as 1994.
Minister O'Rourke's spokesman said she was still eager that anyone with new information to
add to the files would come forward at this time.
In a statement from London last night, Minister Jackson said she was very conscious of the
loss suffered by the relatives and was anxious that the review would proceed as agreed.
| Official Tuskar
crash file was shreddedIrish Independent 19 January 1999
A KEY British document on the 1968
Tuskar Rock plane crash was destroyed by the British Ministry of Transport four years ago,
the Irish Independent has learned.
The official file on the unexplained crash of Aer Lingus flight EI 712 in which 61 people lost their lives was compiled by the MOT's Air Accident Investigation Branch (AAIB), but shredded by department officials in 1994. Public Enterprise Minister Mary O'Rourke last week announced a joint British-Irish review of documents in both country's files on the March 1968 tragedy. The destruction of the file was revealed by Junior Transport Minister Glenda Jackson in an unreported reply to a parliamentary question from Welsh nationalist MP Dafyd Wigley. Ms Jackson said the file had been ``reviewed'' in 1994 but was ``not selected by the Public Record Office for permanent preservation in the National Archive and was destroyed at that time''. RTE's Prime Time programme last week revealed the existence of a previously secret British report on the Royal Navy's role in the search, rescue and salvage mission Operation Tuskar, but the AAIB file may have been the only contemporary document dealing directly with the cause of the crash. Prime Time reporter Mike Milotte said a British air accident expert travelled to Ireland shortly after the crash to assist with the official Irish inquiry and also reported back to the British authorities. Mr Milotte said he believes the investigator's report was the most significant of the papers destroyed in the 1994 MOT shredding operation. ``It seems odd that the Public Record Office would not have selected the Tuskar Rock file for preservation,'' he said. ``It can only fuel suspicion that the British have something to hide.'' |
O Rourke says Aer Lingus has no report on Tuskar
Irish Times 19 Jan 1999
The Minister for Public Enterprise, Ms O'Rourke, has said there is no Aer Lingus report into the 1968 Tuskar Rock air crash. She has also spoken of salvage being handed over to a British ship by the Naval Service.
Speaking on RTÉ's Questions and Answers programme last night, Ms O'Rourke said she had asked an assistant secretary in her Department to contact Aer Lingus yesterday to ask about the unpublished internal report to the airline's board on the crash. This report was referred to by a former senior executive of the airline as recently as last week.
However, the Minister said the report was "not there, not physically there". Her official had found that there was "no written report". All that existed were the oral presentations made by Aer Lingus to the people drafting the government report, which was published in 1970.
"I can't believe it", Ms O'Rourke said. She noted that, "in modern terms of compiling reports and keeping and collating information", 1968 was not that long ago.
Asked whether there was any record of an Aer Lingus report which had gone missing, the Minister said there was not. "There was no report ever given to what was then the Department of Transport on Tuskar Rock."
When she had appealed for new information about the crash, she had received a "very interesting letter" from a retired lieutenant-commander in the Naval Service, Ms O'Rourke said. He had been serving at a more junior rank on the LE Macha at the time of the crash and the subsequent search for wreckage.
He had telephoned his superior officer to find out what should be done with "a piece of salvage" taken on board the Macha. He was told to "give it to the British ship" helping in the salvage operation, which he did, and it was "sent away". This was the first time he had spoken about this episode, the Minister said.
She also said that, following her recent meeting with the British ambassador, Dame Veronica Sutherland, to discuss the Tuskar Rock crash, they had both agreed that the two officials in her Department in charge of investigating air accidents should meet their counterparts in the British Ministry of Defence to "review all the existing information they have on file".
... Not included in the Irish Times report were the following comments made by O'Rourke on the program:
'Aer Lingus tells my department who tell me that there was no written Aer Lingus report - I find that an absolutely amazing thing to have happened, that the airline which had lost a plane and 61 people...didn't make a report...the 1970 Report [ Official Investigation report ] in the light of that time, it was as thorough as the Department could make it...' Also, O'Rourke confirmed that British Naval ships were called in by the Irish authorities as 'We didn't have enough to do the job ourselves'. As to the 'piece of salvage', O'Rourke commented that the retired Lieutenant-Commander reported that there were 'marks on the piece of aircraft and the British ship took it away'.
On the program panel was Jim Mitchell TD who commented that: 'Any reports that exist either here or in Britain should be published at this stage...should be made available and an exhaustive trawl should be made to see are there any official reports or semi-official reports, or reports in the hands of people who were formerly in Aer Lingus'
Personal Comment: I understand from a number of sources that Ms O'Rourke allegedly performed very poorly on the program, appearing to be unsure of her information and overly cautious in her comments. Did anyone else see this program and can comment? Any thoughts on the lack of an Aer Lingus written report in 1968? Considering that this was the airline's first ( and only to date ) passenger crash, is this not surprising? I certainly think so! Email comments to flight712@hotmail.com
Yates Demands Release of Tuskar Rock Flight Documents
The Republic's Opposition spokesman on Public Enterprise, Ivan Yates, plans to challenge the conspiracy theories surrounding the crash of Aer Lingus flight 712. Deputy Yates is alarmed by reports that the British made plane, then 10 years old and bought secondhand by Aer Lingus, suffered a series of corrosion-related problems and that it was one of about 50 - more than one in every 10 built by Vickers - to suffer a fatal accident.
This information was excised from the Accident Report conducted on behalf of the Irish Government and published in 1970. The censorship was a result of pressure from the London authorities who were apparently worried about the commercial implications.
Mr Yates told the Sunday Independent yesterday that he plans to table a series of questions to Mary O'Rourke, Minister for Public Enterprise...demanding the revelation of all information in the possesion of the Irish Government and Aer Lingus following their crash investigations. 'It seems inconsistent for the Minister and others to be calling on the British to co-operate and make data available, when it appears that the contents of an important report in her own hands - irrespective of what it may contain - have not been published in full' he said.
Mr Yates was critical of the statement by Arthur Walls, Aer Lingus Deputy Manager at the time of the crash, that he ( Walls ) saw no obligation to make any reports available. Mr Yates said: 'I don't accept the point made by Aer Lingus that it's report was like any other report to a commerical board. it is of critical emotional consideration for the relatives to try and get some answers. 'I think the publication of all the reports in full - both Irish and British - would help to clarify if there was any interference by the manufacturers, or other vested interests seeking to protect their own position.'
Mr Yates pointed out that Mrs O'Rourke, who with the British authorities, has decided to conduct an official review, has the power to release this documentation.
The 1970 Irish Government report on the loss of the aircraft had suggested that an unmanned aircraft - a drone target aircraft or a missile - might have been involved, pointing to the fact that the British military carried out such manoeuvers from the coast of Wales.
Sunday Independent - Dublin. 17.1.99
For data on the Viscount commercial airline crashes worldwide - click here
| Tuskar
Review Irish Times 'Opinion' January 15 The decision of the Irish and British authorities to conduct a fresh review of the circumstances surrounding the 1968 Tuskar Rock air disaster is, in itself, a welcome development. In its own way, it is a tribute to the commendable work of the Relatives Committee whose campaign for a full inquiry has continued to maintain momentum, some thirty years after the disaster. The question now is whether this latest review, announced after a meeting between the Minister for Public Enterprise, Mrs O'Rourke, and the British ambassador, Dame Veronica Sutherland, has the capacity to uncover the truth. A total of 61 people died when the Aer Lingus Vickers Viscount, St Phelim, en route to London from Cork, crashed near Tuskar Rock, Co Wexford. It was the biggest single loss of life in Irish aviation history. The precise cause of the crash, which caused the plane to fall 17,000 feet into the sea on a clear morning, is still unknown. An Irish government report in 1970 found no obvious reason for the disaster but, intriguingly, it raised questions about the possible involvement of an unmanned aircraft - a drone target or missile - which "might have been there". Mrs O'Rourke has acknowledged that the full circumstances of the crash remain a mystery. This week, RTE's Prime Time reported that the British Ministry of Defence has recently examined its missile capability at the time of the crash. It concluded that no land-based British anti-aircraft missile had the range to strike an aircraft off the Irish coast. But, significantly, it also reported that British cabinet papers relating to a missile test site in Wales were extracted from the files in 1982, just as the media renewed its pursuit of the cause of the 1968 crash. The British authorities have always denied culpability for the crash. In recent days, the British Embassy reaffirmed this position, insisting that there "has never been substantive evidence showing that the crash could be ascribed to British military or other action. We were certain as it was possible to be that it has nothing to do with the United Kingdom." As part of the new review, Irish and British accident investigators will look all the evidence gathered after the crash. There is no guarantee that this will establish any new facts - the omens are not propitious - but it does indicate that the campaign of the Relatives Committee is being taken seriously. For all that, the fact that some relevant British material has apparently been destroyed or lost is not reassuring. It is to be hoped that the review will do something more than assemble and review, once again, the same series of files. In the first instance, the Government might insist that all available documentation in the case is released. It might also insist - the Official Secrets Act notwithstanding - that British defence ministry workers and Army personnel should be allowed to tell all they know. Joint study of Tuskar crash papers planned Irish and British air accident investigators are to begin a joint review of evidence gathered after the 1968 Tuskar Rock disaster which claimed 61 lives and led to allegations of an official cover-up. The decision to conduct a new official review 30 years after the biggest single loss of life in Irish aviation history was taken yesterday after a meeting between the British ambassador, Dame Veronica Sutherland, and Minister for Public Enterprise, Ms O'Rourke. The 1970 Irish government report on the loss of the aircraft found no obvious reason for the disaster, but suggested that an unmanned aircraft - a drone target aircraft or a missile - "might have been there". Renewed public interest in the tragedy has grown following the 30th anniversary of the crash of the St Phelim. Controversial claims have been made that British missile tests led to the downing of the Aer Lingus aircraft. There are no plans for the review group to hear submissions from relatives or other interested parties. The Minister and the British embassy in Dublin yesterday said no new evidence had emerged to determine the cause of the crash. "It is still a mystery," Ms O'Rourke said. The British embassy said: "There has never been substantive evidence showing that the crash could be ascribed to British military or other action. We were certain as it was possible to be that it had been nothing to do with the United Kingdom." Last night RTÉ's Primetime said that in the past two months the British Ministry of Defence had analysed its missile capability at the time of the crash. A confidential report concluded that no land-based British anti-aircraft missile had the range to strike an aircraft off the Irish coast. It said the most powerful missile at the time had a range of only half the width of the Irish Sea. The programme also said British cabinet papers relating to a missile test site in Wales were extracted from the files and destroyed in 1982, "just as the media posed questions about missile involvement in the crash". Relatives of the victims have given a qualified welcome to the announced review. Mr Michael Burke, who lost his mother and grandmother in the tragedy, urged Ms O'Rourke to ensure the review would be of all relevant documents. "I believe the plane was hit by a missile or another plane and I can't see the British Ministry of Defence ever releasing any document which will tell us that," Mr Burke said. Mr Jerome McCormack, who lost a brother, said the minutes of a meeting of British and Irish officials held in Wales on the day of the disaster have never been revealed. "If they have nothing to hide, then surely they should bring everything out into the open." |
|
Irish & British Investigators to re-examine evidence of disaster....
British say their missiles in 1968 did not have the range to hit the aircraft...
Revealed - British cabinet papers relating to the missile test site in Wales were extracted from official files and destroyed in 1982.
Irish and British air accident investigators are to begin a joint review of evidence gathered since the 1968 crash. The decision to conduct a new official review 30 years after the biggest single loss of life in Irish aviation history was taken today following a meeting between the British Ambassador to Ireland, Dame Veronica Sutherland and the Irish Minister for Public Enterprise, Ms O'Rourke.
However, there are no plans for the review group to hear submissions from relatives or other interested parties. Both the Minister and Ambassador said that no new evidence had emerged to determine the cause of the crash. 'It's still a mystery' Ms O'Rourke stated.
The British Embassy were more vocal. 'There has never been substantial evidence showing that the crash could be ascribed to British military or other action. We were certain as it was possible to be that it had been nothing to do with the United Kingdom.'
Irish TV news program - 'Prime Time' said that in the past two months ( November-December 1998 ) the British Ministry of Defence had analysed its missile capability at the time of the crash. A confidential report concluded that no land-based British anti-aircraft missile had the range to strike an aircraft off the Irish coast. It said the most powerful missile at the time had a range of only half the width of the Irish Sea.
The Programme also said that British cabinet papers relating to the missile testing site in Wales ( Aberporth ) were extracted from the files and destroyed in 1982 'just as the media posed questions about missile involvement in the crash'.
Relatives of the victims have given a qualified welcome to the announced review. Mr Michael Burke, who lost his mother and grandmother in the tragedy, urged Ms O'Rourke to ensure the review would be of all the relvant documents. 'I believe the plane was hit by a missile or another plane and I can't see the British Ministry of Defence ever releasing any document which will tell us that.' Mr Burke said.
Mr Jerome McCormack, who lost a brother, said the minutes of a meeting of British and Irish officials held in Wales on the day of the disaster have never been revealed. 'If they have nothing to hide, then surely they should bring everything out into the open.'
Source: Irish Times 13.1.99.
| Ahern
urged to raise Tuskar Disaster with Blair The Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, is being asked to raise the 1968 Tuskar Air Disaster with the British Prime Minister, Mr Blair, in an attempt to unearth fresh evidence on a possible cause of the crash. The request comes from the Waterford Labour TD, Mr Brian O'Shea, who says he believes the plane was downed by a missile fired by a mobile unit of the British Royal Artillery. A total of 61 people lost their lives when the Aer Lingus Vickers Viscount, en route to London from Cork, fell 17,000 feet into the sea on a clear Sunday morning. Over the past 30 years there has been speculation the disaster was caused by missile testing carried out by the British Ministry of Defence in the area at the time. The outgoing British ambassador, Dame Veronica Sutherland, is to meet the Minister for Public Enterprise, Ms O'Rourke, on the issue tomorrow. While the ambassador has indicated the meeting is purely out of humanitarian concern for the relatives of those who died and there is no chance of a new investigation, Ms O'Rourke has said she would call a new inquiry if new evidence came to light. Yesterday, Mr O'Shea said that evidence could be simply obtained. He is to ask the Taoiseach to suggest to Mr Blair that British defence personnel be allowed to breach the Official Secrets Act in relation to the events of March 24th, 1968, to enable them to give evidence. After seven years of investigation, Mr O'Shea says he now believes recordings of British army manoeuvres in the area, picked up by London radar on the day, provide the key to the disaster. "At the time the army recordings were dismissed because they were just the army, not the Royal Air Force. But in fact there were mobile army units working from Llanbedr, Manorbier, and Ty Croes taking part in missile testing regularly...I have learnt that these men were out on that day and that they fired at their target plane which was situated north of Cardigan Bay and saw it disappear from radar. They were surprised later when those observing the target telephoned to ask why the missile had not arrived...These men now want to tell their stories but are prevented from doing so by the British Official Secrets Act."
The author of that article, Phil Davies, told The Irish Times yesterday there was a unit of the Territorial Army at Aberporth on the weekend of the crash. Mr Davies said his information was that among themselves they had acknowledged their involvement. Set Aside Official Secrets Act, Blair urged. A LABOUR TD, who has been campaigning for
more than a decade to have every shred of evidence into the Tuskar Rock disaster brought
into the public domain, last night called on the Taoiseach to urge the British Prime
Minister, Tony Blair, to set aside the UK Official Secrets Act to try and resolve the
mystery of the Aer Lingus Viscount crash which claimed 61 lives more than 30 years ago. Cork Examiner Did British missile hit Flight 712?Ireland reopens 30-year mystery over Aer Lingus crash reports John Mullin. Monday January 11 1999 - The Guardian - London For three decades Ireland's conspiracy theorists have dissected the mystery ofAer Lingus Flight 712, which inexplicably plunged into the Irish Sea from 17,000ft on a fine spring day, killing all 61 passengers and crew. Tomorrow, Mary O'Rourke, the republic's enterprise minister, will re-open the case of the 1968 disaster when she meets the outgoing British ambassador to Dublin, Dame Veronica Sutherland. Ms O'Rourke now believes there was no aircraft failure, once more fuelling speculation that a British missile or target drone downed the plane. At that time, the Ministry of Defence tested surface-to-air missiles over the IrishSea, firing at pilotless aircraft, but denies involvement. Victims' relatives banded together last year to find the truth. Jerome McCormack, aged 51, a Cork chef, who lost his brother, Neil, 35, said: "We need to lift the embargo of silence so those in the know are allowed to speak freely. We are not looking for anyone to be hanged. We just want to know what happened." The St Phelim, a Vickers Viscount, crashed off the Wexford coast just after noon on Sunday, March24, 1968, en route from Cork to Heathrow. Its penultimate, garbled message indicated another aircraft was in the area. In its last message, eight seconds later, co-pilot Paul Heffernan, aged 22, said: "12,000 ft descending, spinning rapidly." Witnesses say Captain Barney O'Beirne, aged 35, managed to level the four-engine plane about 1,000 ft above the water, and flew on for about 15 minutes before it crashed close to Tuskar Rock. There was no black box recorder on the aircraft, which had undergone a major inspection three weeks earlier. A paragraph in investigator Richard O'Sullivan's report is responsible for much of the speculation. He noted: "The conclusion that there was another aircraft involved is inescapable. No aircraft have been reported missing, but there remained the possibility that an unmarked aircraft, either a drone aircraft target or a missile, might have been there." The most popular theory is that theSt Phelim was hit by a rogue missile fired from the Royal Aircraft Establishment's range at Aberporth in Dyfed, then Britain's most advanced missile testing station. The MoD says the range was closed on Sundays. However, RTE, the state broadcaster, last year found inconsistencies in log books, and suggested testing could have taken place that day. A second theory suggests that because a special radar transponder on the St Phelim failed, a British warship conducting exercises in the area, HMS Penelope, mistook the aircraft for a target drone. The MoD says no ships were close enough. But it admits that the log books of two of the five vessels in the vicinity are missing. It has never provided the logs of the others, including HMS Penelope, because the Irish government did not ask for them. Another version is that the St Phelim may have been struck by a pilotless drone. Several witnesses described an aircraft with red wings close to the plane's last reported position. The RAF then used de-commissioned Meteor jets for target practice, and the remains of one werediscovered off Tuskar Rock in 1974. Fishermen ridicule RAF claims that the wreckage floated there, saying currents and tides make that impossible. Whatever brought the St Phelim down, local people puzzle over the search operation, which was led by the Royal Navy. It took 70 days to find the wreckage, despite several reports which pinpointed where it was finally discovered. A local trawlerman,Billy Bates, found it on his first visit there. He says the navy had told him it had looked there three times already. The search team on HMS Reclaim then tried to raise the fuselage without using a steel net. It scattered as it broke the surface and sunk to the seabed. With it went many of the victims, and any chanceof discovering what had happened. Ms O'Rourke said: "The RTE programme was vivid, and the evidence put forward did not find an echo in the records here. Iremain open if there is new evidence to push further on this issue. It is an unexplained mystery." Copyright Guardian Media Group plc.
Ministers to try to establish
truth on Tuskar air disaster tragedy
Fatal flight downed by missile, claims
document
Chink of light flickers over air crash mystery OPEN TO TRUTH ... Mary O’Rourke,
the Republic’s minister with responsibility for dealing with air accidents, may soon
banish the secrecy which has hung over Ireland’s worst air disaster for 30 years
Envoy, O'Rourke to meet on air crash The British ambassador, Dame Veronica Sutherland, is to meet the Minister for Public Enterprise, Mrs O'Rourke, next week about the 1968 Tuskar Rock air tragedy in which 61 people died. The ambassador wanted to have the meeting before her departure from Dublin on Friday week. The tragedy, the biggest aviation disaster in Irish history, is the main item on the agenda. The Minister of State for the Marine, Mr Hugh Byrne, had a background meeting with the ambassador last year about the disaster. A spokeswoman for the Minister said last night that she had no indication that the British had anything new to say about the tragedy. "There is no indication that they have any explanation for the accident. It is just a courtesy visit," a spokeswoman said. Mrs O'Rourke met the ambassador at the funeral of the Quinn children in the North last summer. It was then that she said she would like to meet the Minister to discuss the Tuskar Rock tragedy. Mrs O'Rourke met relatives of the victims of the crash on the 30th anniversary of the tragedy this year. The crash, on March 24th, 1968, claimed the lives of all 57 passengers and four crew members of the Aer Lingus Viscount aircraft St Phelim. The craft was on a scheduled flight from Cork Airport to Heathrow in London when it plunged into St George's Channel off the Wexford coast. The craft was last heard of at 11.37 a.m., when London air traffic control picked up a garbled message which included the words "one thousand feet, spinning rapidly". It was the second fatal crash of an Aer Lingus aircraft since the company began operations in 1936. In 1952, an Aer Lingus Dakota crashed killing 23 people. Thirty-five of the Tuskar Rock victims had addresses in Ireland and all except one lived in Co Cork. Also among the dead were residents of Switzerland, Britain and Belgium. Last year, evidence supporting the theory that the plane had been hit by an out-of-control British missile was shown by RTÉ's Prime Time programme. Although the British government had always maintained that there was no testing at the Aberporth testing facility in midWales on the weekend of the illfated flight, the programme showed anomalies in the facility's log-book. Relatives of those who died last year formed a group to press for a public inquiry. Irish Times
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Last November, an article in the Cardiff-based Western Mail reported
contact with members of the Territorial Army who alleged it was an open secret among
members that they had brought down the aircraft by accident. 
Former Managing Director and Chairman
of Vickers ( 1962-67 ), Maj.Gen Sir Charles Dunphie dies aged 96. (
Announced in the London Times January 26th 1999 )