Rugby auction in aid of trawler fund
The auction is taking place as the search for the missing fishermen, GerBohan and Tomas Jagla, is intensified on what is the crucial 21st day of the search.
Kinsale Rugby Club has donated a pair of tickets to both of Ireland’s home Six Nation’s games so they could be auctioned in aid of the fund set up after thelocally based trawler, the Honeydew II, sank. The auction is going out live on Cork 96FM’s Neil Prendeville show.
At the end of yesterday’s show, the highest bid had reached €5,000.
Chairman of the Kinsale Harbour Board Eamonn O’Neill said judging from the outpouring of goodwill, he expects the bid to go even higher.
“Obviously with a figure like that we are delighted with the response but we do hope by the time the auction wraps up today it will have gone higher.
“There has been a huge response to the fund, people have been so generous. I know from the bank in Kinsale every morning there are notes posted in through the letter box and that is coming in from country wide.”
The last bid of €5,000 was received yesterday by an anonymous bidder. A spokesman for the morning time current affairs show said it will be bringing down the hammer on the bidding at midday today.
The Honeydew II’s skipper Ger Bohan and crew member Thomas Jagla are missing, presumed drowned, since the trawler sank on January 12. The appeal fund has been set up for the families they left behind.
The shoreline search for the men’s bodies is being stepped up as it is believed a window of opportunity to spot any bodies on the surface of the water is open.
Mr O’Neill said bus loads of search teams are being ferried from Kinsale to three coast-guard stations inWaterford as the searchenters its third week.
There is also a fleet of ribs and trawlers scheduled to engage in an off-shore search at the weekend.
“If the bodies are in the water then they say after 21 days they will surface. So we are putting everything we can into the next few days.
“The buses are leaving on Saturday morning at nine and everybody is welcome.
“So far so many people have given so much of their time. There are people who have been out searching for 14 days straight.”
Donations to the appeal fund can be made at the AIB, 6 Pearse Street, Kinsale, Co Cork account number 04161182, sort code 934089.
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