Landslide victims seek EU help

RESIDENTS of Derrybrien village in Co Galway hope to enlist EU Environment Commissioner Margot Wallstrom’s support for compensation for the disastrous landslide which struck their community last month.

“We have sent a letter to the commissioner requesting her to look at the whole situation and to investigate it,” Martin Collins, spokesman for Derrybrien Landslide Action Group, said last night.

He said the group wants Ms Wallstrom to investigate the issue in light of the fact that Galway County Council has considered an environmental impact statement (EIS) on the controversial ESB-owned windfarm at the centre of the row to be inadequate.

The EIS was compiled by Tralee-based Saorgas Energy Ltd, former owners of the mountain-top windfarm site on Slieve Aughty mountains.

Files show Saorgas had applied to the county council in 2002 to lower the level of foundations of 25 of its 71 wind turbines by between a half metre and one metre, contrary to planning conditions.

However, a spokesman for current owners Hibernian Wind Power Ltd said he did not believe this had any significance regarding the recent bog slides.

Last month, a mass of mud and debris moved an estimated four kilometres disturbing over 70 acres of bog and threatening the quality of the water supply to nearby Gort which is served by Lough Cutra.

At one stage the Portumna to Gort road was closed and the Loughrea to Derrybrien road was also blocked off, forcing residents to make diversions.

Asked what he wanted Ms Wallstrom to do, Mr Collins said he expected she would make contact with the Irish authorities, at the very least, including Galway County Council, to see what steps they were taking to deal with the landslide.