Belly of the Beast: Part 2

national | miscellaneous | news report

Sunday January 19, 2003 23:38

by Blisset

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Image 1: Tim continues to complain loudly to the Airport police who are shadowing, surrounding and watching us. I continue to film while pretending I'm just hanging around goofing off on the spectacle. Tim is telling them that journalists in the US have written about the Shannon stopover in some detail in the context of 'our troops and their journey to the Middle East' type stories. Tim reads aloud from these for the audience of Airport Police. He makes the point again that Ryanair passengers from the UK arriving at Shannon have no idea that the Airport is being used extensively by the US Military, and have no idea that their plane is parked next to a Hercules. Tim tells them they are not doing all they can to ensure the safety of civilians in the airport. The 5/7 live lady keeps recording. John Gormley looks on without commenting.

Image 2: Ed Horgan comes over and tells us that a leased aircraft carrying US troops has just landed.

Image 3: We head outside. We travel along the terminal building and come to a fence. We can see the engine and wing of the leased aircraft. I continue filming but we are quickly pounced upon by Airport Police. They tell me that they have told me already to stop filming. I tell them I thought they meant indoors. Ed, John and Tim have a conversation about how close to the plane we actually are. It is easily within range of a grenade Ed tells us. That much is obvious even to me. I could have hit the plane with a stone from where we were. I had been in the same place the previous night wandering around with a video camera without anyone hassling me or even noticing me. So much for the stepped up security at the airport we have been hearing so much about in the papers.

Image 4. Ed and Tim led us into what they described as a 'semi-restricted' area. They hoped the presence of John Gormley would help them get closer to where troops would be disembarking from the plane. However we were blocked by Airport police again.

Image 5. At this point a Garda car came along and the garda inside asked John Gormley into the car to have a private word. The car drove 30/40 yards up the road we had been trying to follow. As it was driving away I had a paranoid moment. I thought they were getting him offside so they could arrest us or take our film or the RTE lady's minidisc. But the car stopped and we relaxed and waited. John later told me that the Guard had told him that Immigration had been informed of the complaint made by Tim earlier from the airport. John asked if this meant the plane would be searched. He told me that the Garda replied: 'I didn't say that'. Five minutes later he was back and we headed back in the direction of the terminal