galway docks whats going on??

notlongleft

Does anyone know what is going on at the docks tonite?? there s helicopters and boats searching everywhere????

galwaybabe

Just wondering the same myself. Can see the helicopter from Tirellan heights!

ronnie3585

Was walking down Bridge St this evening and there was a lot of commotion around the walk beside the river. Happened to meet a mate of mine there who said that a lady had gone into the river. As I walked on toward Mill St I was passed by a good few guards and the fire engine wizzed passed me later on.

Does anyone know what happened, did the lady get out alive?

notlongleft

well i live on the docks and its all going on for the last hour right outside the window. keep shining the lights on the water everywhere - hope its not someone missing its a bit errie!

galwaybabe

Is it connected with this - http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055394832

notlongleft

oh god i m sure it is then and that s the last thing i want to hear! poor woman. they havent found anything yet anyway! fingers crossed

ronnie3585

It appears so. Could the mods lock my thread or transfer it to this, I can't seem to do it.

The Shannon based SAR helicopter landed at the hospital at about 9.15ish, I can still hear it there now. Hopefully they got the person out of the river.

skymacfly

ronnie3585 wrote: »

Was walking down Bridge St this evening and there was a lot of commotion around the walk beside the river. Happened to meet a mate of mine there who said that a lady had gone into the river. As I walked on toward Mill St I was passed by a good few guards and the fire engine wizzed passed me later on.

Does anyone know what happened, did the lady got out alive?

Theres another thread going on about a search in the docks coulb be conneected ..

please god she gets out alive the poor thing

galwaybabe

Fingers crossed she's ok

notlongleft

well from what i can see they havent found anyone yet. Its all just gone quiet now though.

Steyr

ronnie3585 wrote: »

The Shannon based SAR helicopter landed at the hospital at about 9.15ish, I can still hear it there now. Hopefully they got the person out of the river.

The Sikorsky S61N did not land at the Hospital, she arrived on scene and stayed there searching. She has since returned to base at Shannon, spent well over an hour searching the area, i was down there as was alot of Claddagh residents, Fire service, Gardai.

Fingers crossed.

galwayrush

Doesn't look good,:(

JohnCleary

Ah christ, not again. For once i'm glad i'm not in Galway this week

Wasn't such a good outcome last Sunday night

Hopefully however this woman entered the water was an accident and she's OK.

Tip: For anyone who's contemplating taking their life by drowning themsleves in the river - DON'T, you have no idea the stress you can put on people

JohnCleary

Steyr wrote: »

The Sikorsky S61N did not land at the Hospital, she arrived on scene and stayed there searching. She has since returned to base at Shannon, spent well over an hour searching the area, i was down there as was alot of Claddagh residents, Fire service, Gardai.

Fingers crossed.

Tis some machine - The main centre spotlight is amazing, had half the river lit up last week. Only thing about shining a light from that height onto the water is that it won't penetrate, only show up anything that's on the surface. When you need the light to penetrate the water the source needs to be as close to the water as possible

ronnie3585

JohnCleary wrote: »

Wasn't such a good outcome last Sunday night

Did someone else go into the river on Sunday?

punchdrunk

i imagine the searchlight was for the benefit of the searchers on the ground,the chopper would be panning with the FLIR thermal camera,much easier for them to see a person with that amazing piece of kit,

hopefully she gets out ok,but with the water temp dropping due to the winter coming survival time in the water wouldn't be too long

JohnCleary

punchdrunk wrote: »

i imagine the searchlight was for the benefit of the searchers on the ground,the chopper would be panning with the FLIR thermal camera,much easier for them to see a person with that amazing piece of kit

Fair point

hopefully she gets out ok,but with the water temp dropping due to the winter coming survival time in the water wouldn't be too long

In Ireland, September usually has the warmest water temp, I know this from scuba diving/swimming/skiing etc.... It will start to get colder over the coming weeks. From December - April, good luck, you won't last long

punchdrunk

JohnCleary wrote: »

In Ireland, September usually has the warmest water temp, I know this from scuba diving/swimming/skiing etc.... It will start to get colder over the coming weeks. From December - April, good luck, you won't last long

strange,didn't know that
well thats good news for her,hopefully it buys the searchers more time

skelliser

is the tide in or out?
was the inshore lifeboat there?

well the fact that the heli was there for ~hour and then returned to shannon isnt really a good sign im afraid
in truth you only have a window of ~20-25 minutes from the time of entering the river possibly less

JohnCleary

skelliser wrote: »

in truth you only have a window of ~20-25 minutes from the time of entering the river possibly less

That varies a lot from person to person. Some people won't last 5 mins in the water, some people will last 5 hours etc....
The problem with the tidal part of the Corrib is that with the agressive flow (How many weir gates are open today? I'm not in Galway so don't know) you could knock your head or an undercurrent could pull you down


The helicopter isin't necessarily 'bad news' - they can only stay in the air for so long before running out of fuel. But yes I agree, the Docks/tidal part of the Corrib is a very dangerous place where I would NOT like to be, if someone was still alive and floating after coming down the river they'd obviously be a good swimmer and would be able to swim to the shore

Steyr

The tide was on the way out, and Rescue 115 was using the lights everywhere not just for the benefit of the Galway Lifeboat, fair play to everybody involved, looks like it may be bad news though, also i noticed the FLIR ball moving but i dont know if it would do much as JC pointed out its getting cold now and the body temperature will drop rapidly in that water, also the S61N has an endruance of 4 hours airborne and EINN ( Shannon ) is only 12-15 minutes flying time in that magnificent helicopter.

JohnCleary

Never knew the response time was so little from Shannon => Galway, amazing.

I've talked to the Heli guys a few times over the VHF when co-ordinating where to shine spotlights when searching - are those guy's on Valium or something, they always sound so cool and chilled out

po0k

I'm closing this thread.