This article is from page 10 of the 2014-01-07 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 10 JPG
THE face of Whitestrand beach in Miltown Malbay could be changed forever as the weekends storm ripped away a 50-year-old sea wall and washed large sections of the beach and nearby land into the sea.
According to local landowner Noel Shannon, the beach and surrounding areas have been left devastated after this once-in-a-hundred-year storm.
“It is absolute devastation up here at the moment. The sea wall has been washed away and caravans have been hit and damaged. Most of the sea front at the Whitestrand has been wash away and the rest is covered with rocks. I was just there this minute [Monday morning] and the place is a disaster,” he said.
“The biggest issue is the concrete sea wall, which has been just swept away. I’ve never seen anything like it. That was was holding the sea back; it’s been there for 40 or 50 years.
“There has been a lot of attention for other areas, and rightly so, but the Whitestrand is a very popular spot for young swimmers and for lifeguard training and it needs to be looked at and given some attention.”
Mr Shannon, who operated the nearby Whitestrand Caravan Park, and says that he has lost a considerable amount of the land to the storm – with massive waves simply washing sections of land into the sea.
“There is a lot of ground lost to the sea and there is an awful lot of work that needs to be to done to get the Whitestrand up and going for the tourism season. Parts of my land are no longer there anymore, they have washed into the sea,” he said.
“The council [Clare County Council] were out to us over the weekend but there is not a lot can be done until the storm blows over.”