Increase of women in the military ‘encouraged’
Latest figures provided to the Irish Examiner show 555 of the 8,855 members of the Defence Forces are women and several of them have senior appointments.
The highest proportion of women (7.1%) is in the Naval Service, where 67 women form part of that 945-strong force.
Of the 7,181 total personnel in the Army, 459 or 6.4% are women, while the 795-strong Air Corps has 29 women (3.8%).
According to a Defence Forces spokesman, women are also doing very well in senior positions.
There are 114 female officers in the Army, 28 in the Naval Service and five in the Air Corps.
A number of sisters have become officers in the Defences Forces.
Unique among them are two Cork-born sisters, Caroline Mooney Murphy and Joanne Mooney.
They both hold comparable ranks, with one in the Army and one in the Naval Service.
Caroline is a Lieutenant Commander based with the Naval Service at Haulbowline and Joanne is a Commandant commanding the Military Police of 1st Southern Brigade at Collins Barracks, Cork.
Tipperary-born Roberta O’Brien made history on November 14, 2008, when she became the first woman to take command of a Naval Service Ship, LÉ Aisling.
On Sept 24, 1996, Ann Brogan commenced training to become the first woman Air Corps cadet.
She retired with the rank of Captain.
* 1922: Brigid Lyons Thornton becomes the first woman to serve in Defence Forces. She held the rank of Commandant in the Army Medical Corps, but never wore a uniform.
* 1979: The necessary legislation to enable the enlistment of women into the Defence Forces was introduced in the Dáil and the first female officers were commissioned two years later.
* 1982: The first four women to serve with an Irish UN force joined the 52 Infantry Battalion in Lebanon.
* 1994: The Defence Forces now has unrestricted access to all corps, services and operational areas, at home and overseas.
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