Search for CUH helipad site to continue amid funding delays

A decade-long search by Ireland’s largest trauma centre for a helicopter pad is set to continue due to chronic funding gaps and delays.

A meeting of the HSE South regional health forum has heard that Cork University Hospital will be forced to continue using Cork International Airport and local rugby fields for the emergency service because no permanent site has been found for a long-awaited helipad.

Local politicians and patients have repeatedly raised safety concerns over the issue since a previous helipad was “temporarily” removed from the hospital at the height of the boom in 2002 to make way for building work.