Hopes for resurrection of Naomh Éanna ‘all but sunk’
The future of the Naomh Éanna – the former Galway-Aran ferry – looks distinctly grim despite the last ditch efforts of a number of TDs and a group of voluntary supporters to halt the plans of Waterways Ireland to cut up the vessel.
Built in the Liffey Dockyard in Dublin in 1958, the MV Naomh Éanna served her entire life as an Aran passenger ferry – until she was secured by the Irish Nautical Trust in 1989 and moved to the Grand Canal Dock in Dublin, where she has been moored ever since.
Derrick Hambleton of An Taisce in Galway said that proposals to rescue the ferry and make some sort of tourist attraction out of it have been given “short shrift” at ministerial and departmental level.
Galway TDs Éamon Ó Cúiv and Sean Kyne, along with Dublin TDs Joan Collins and Kevin Humphries, all made impassioned speeches to Minister for Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht, Jimmy Deenihan, to put a six-month stay on her break-up to allow for plans for the future of the Naomh Éanna to be secured.
“The MV Naomh Éanna’s proposed restoration and return to Galway now looks anything but safe and assured. In fact, if we are to be honest, the imminent break-up and destruction of this once proud vessel looks to be now on the cards and a miracle will be needed if we are ever to see her docked in Galway again,” said Mr Hambleton.
When the voluntary committee, the Naomh Éanna Trust, met with Minister Deenihan and an attending official from Waterways Ireland earlier in the month they were given given a reprieve of four weeks.
“This is a totally unrealistic time frame within which to prepare a business plan and to secure any financial backing for the restoration.
“It would seem to me that the volunteer group were never going to be allowed a realistic time-span to gather their plans together and be allowed put forward any realistic proposal to save the vessel,” said the An Taisce Galway chairman.
However the members of the Trust continue to fight for the rejuvenation of the Naomh Éanna, pursuing their campaign to raise funds, having created a PayPal option for donations on their Facebook page.