Only a handful of people know the existence of the only burial plot in Ireland of two of the Air India disaster victims, and one man has lovingly tended it for 30 years.

They came to say goodbye to an old lady who served her country faithfully for 35 years, during which time she sailed the equivalent distance to the moon and back.

THE year is 1985 and two bored, skittish boys, aged 10 and 13, decide to skip school and hop on a DART train for a ride that will take them thousands of miles past their stop.

THERE was an air of hushed expectation as news of the fatal plane crash began to circulate among staff and patients at Cork University Hospital yesterday morning.

“FOR years my wife said there was only one other woman in my life,” Lt Cdr Peter Twomey said.

FAMILIES bereaved by the Air India disaster off Ahakista have strengthened their ties with the Co Cork village with the creation of a memorial monument featuring a piece of local rock.

THE people of Cork and the small peninsula community in West Cork that comforted the families and friends of the Air India disaster, at the time of the tragedy and during the sad pilgrimages over the past two decades, were thanked yesterday.

I AM writing to you on the 20th anniversary (June 23) of the Air India disaster off the Cork coast.

Sean O’Riordan

THE LE Aisling was one of the first ships to arrive at the scene of the felled Air India Flight 182, around four hours after air traffic controllers at Shannon lost contact with the Boeing 747 jet airliner.

A SIKH militant has admitted killing 329 people on board an Air India jet that was blown up 110 miles south of the Cork coast in 1985.