Aer Lingus passenger places ad in paper to find missed connection on Dublin flight

As hundreds of thousands of people prepare to shower loved ones with trinkets of affection, spare a thought for one man whose chances of finding his Valentine are literally on a wing and a prayer.

Despite almost 18 months elapsing since the chance encounter, the smitten man is so desperate to contact the object of his affections that he took out a newspaper advert in an Irish Examiner personal column yesterday.

Under the heading “Man would really like to contact lady”, he reveals the person he is trying to track down is “probably in her fifties”.

He claims to have met her on an Aer Lingus flight from Heathrow to Dublin on Tuesday, October 7, 2014. The flight number was EI 163.

Despite the short duration of the flight — it is little more than an hour from take-off to pulling up at the gate — the woman obviously made an impression as the details in his advert make it clear he remembered everything about the trip.

“She was in a window seat. I was in an aisle seat, right hand side of the plane facing cockpit about halfway down,” he wrote. “There was an empty seat between us. On landing, I took her case, bright red and her coat from the overhead locker for her.”

The man recalls that the woman was wearing “calf-length boots and black tights” before describing his own clothes as a “green sweater and fawn slacks”.

Meanwhile, research has found that more than a third of Irish male workers have secretly fancied a colleague at some point. However, female employees are less likely to fall for a co-worker with only 23% admitting to an “office crush”.

Irish Life’s survey also had over a fifth of the workforce admitting to having had an office romance at some point. Men were more likely to engage in an office romance, with 23% saying they have experienced a romantic encounter with a colleague, compared to 20% of female employees.