YESTERYEARS: Freak 'whirlwind like tornado' rip holiday homes apart for Tipperary families

For this week’s YESTERYEARS column we venture back a full quarter of a century to our edition dated June 6, 1998.

There was good news on the employment front that week when the Tánaiste, Mary Harney, on a visit to Clonmel, announced that 60 new jobs were coming to the Tipperary Town based Continental Promotion Group where the workforce was set to rise to 100 within two years, according to Michael Heverin’s report. Welcoming the jobs boost for a hard-pressed Tipperary Town, the Tánaiste was also delighted to hear that the jobs build-up at the nearby Pall Corporation was approaching 80 and was on target to reach 100 by the end of that year.

Ms Harney was in Clonmel to brief the local Task Force on efforts by her Department and the IDA to secure an alternative industry for Seagate, the American computer manufacturers who made their shock pull-out announcement from Clonmel at the end of 1992. She went on to say that she hoped to be able to announce a new industry for Clonmel before August.

A question mark hung over the future of Tipperary Racecourse despite denials from its owners that week that the track was to close. The chief executive of the Irish Horse Racing Authority, Noel Ryan, said no decision had yet been taken but he confirmed that its future had been discussed by the authority. However, director of Tipperary Racecourse, local businessman Arthur Pierse, said that it had been confirmed to him that the track was to close and he described this as another shattering blow to the town.

Two Clonmel familes were fortunate to be alive that week, wrote Eamon Lacey, after a freak storm destroyed their holiday homes as they were sleeping. Members of the O’Dwyer and Quirke families had a miraculous escape from death after a “whirlwind like tornado” ripped their holiday homes at Ballinclamper, four miles outside Dungarvan.

Four adults and five children were hospitalised after their homes were blown apart. Within seconds the two caravans were reduced to rubble and some contents were discovered later that morning over three quarters of a mile away. In one mobile home were Tim and Pat O’Dwyer with their children Darren (17), Kim (16) and Gavin (13), while in the other were Seamus and Catherine Quirke with their children Stephen (6) and Laura (8).