Fish out of water rescue bid
Hundreds of fish were rescued from a stream yesterday following a “significant” peat slide, which threatened stocks.
The overnight slide occurred when a wedge of bog became dislodged during the construction of a road at a windfarm development, just south of Drumkeerin village on the Leitrim-Roscommon border.
Staff from Coillte and Hibernian Wind Power (a subsidiary of ESB), co-developers of the windfarm project at Garvagh Glebe North, worked through Tuesday night and early yesterday morning erecting dams to contain the slide and prevent it flowing into the nearby Lough Allen.
Specialist geo-technical teams were on site last night to continue to monitor the flow which was being contained by the dams. Local farmers also watched anxiously amid mounting fear that the peat slide would breach the dam and spread onto agricultural land.
Yesterday officers from the Shannon Regional Fisheries Board removed between 500 and 600 juvenile brown trout from the Abhann Ghearr stream, a tributary of Lough Allen.
Fisheries Inspector Matt Nolan described the slide as potentially extremely harmful.
“We are talking about a significant wedge of bog and forestry which is gradually moving down river in the direction of Lough Allen.
“Leitrim is very dependent on angling tourism and anything that could damage Lough Allen would have a significant impact on the economy of the county.”
Local councillor Mary Bohan (FF), who visited the scene yesterday morning, said that the early alert was critical to averting a disaster.
But she added that there were fears there could be a re-occurrence.
“While there is no immediate damage, my concerns are that there is an underlying problem. The mountain has been disturbed and the fear now is that it could happen again,” she said.
A spokesperson for the ESB confirmed that the situation had been brought under control.
- Anita Guidera
25 September 2008
Tags: Wind power, Wind energy
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