Eleven people are injured when a car bomb rocks the centre of Moira, County Down, on the evening of February 20, 1998. The injured include seven Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) officers, one a policewoman, and four civilians. The RUC Chief Constable, Ronnie Flanagan, who visits the scene the following morning, says that a warning was issued by a man with a “southern” accent in calls to the Maze and Maghaberry prisons. He adds that a vehicle, possibly the getaway car, was discovered on the southern route of the M1 motorway, suggesting that the attack may have come from south of the Border.
The car bomb, estimated at 500 lbs., is planted outside the local RUC station and explodes at approximately 11:40 PM, about ten minutes after the warnings are issued. Houses and pubs in the vicinity of the RUC station are evacuated. Local people described the explosion as “huge” and “massive.”
The attack comes just hours after Sinn Féin is expelled from the talks about the future of the province by the British Government because of recent IRA killings. By the following morning, no organisation has admitted responsibility for the bombing.
There are reports of the explosion being heard 20 miles away from Moira, which is a picturesque village about 20 miles west of Belfast.
The injured are rushed to Craigavon Area Hospital. None of the injuries are believed to be critical. Flanagan says the damage caused to the local RUC station is significant. A number of nearby houses are also extensively damaged. “One house was virtually demolished in the explosion,” says a police source.
The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) justice spokesman, Ian Paisley, Jr., who lives nearby, believes that the bomb is initially intended for a specific target in the nearby town of Lisburn, but because of heavy policing the bombers set off the device instead in Moira. “I lay the blame completely at the door of the Provisional IRA,” he says.
In December 2013, a 43-year-old man is arrested in Moy, County Tyrone, and questioned about the attack, but is later released unconditionally. A 47-year-old man is arrested in Dungannon, County Tyrone, on May 7, 2014. He is taken to Antrim police station for questioning but is also released unconditionally.
(From: “11 injured in bomb blast in Co Down,” by Gerry Moriarty, The Irish Times, http://www.irishtimes.com, February 21, 1998)
According to journalistEd Moloney, the IRA Army Council, suspecting a great deal of infiltration by double agents at the grassroots level of the IRA, decide to form an experimental flying column (rather than the usual active service unit) to mount a large-scale operation against a permanent vehicle checkpoint along the border. It hopes that this will prevent any information leak that might result in another fiasco like the Loughgall Ambush of 1987.
Moloney maintains that the planning is in the charge of Thomas Murphy, alleged leader of the South Armagh Brigade, and that the raid is to be led by East Tyrone Brigade member Michael “Pete” Ryan. Journalist Ian Bruce instead claims that the IRA unit is led by an Irish citizen who had served in the Parachute Regiment, citing intelligence sources. The column is made up of about 20 experienced IRA volunteers from throughout Northern Ireland, eleven of whom are to carry out the attack itself. Bruce reports that IRA members from County Monaghan, supported by local Fermanagh militants, carry out the raid.
The target is a permanent vehicle checkpoint at Derryard. Described as a “mini base,” it includes an accommodation block and defensive sangars. It is manned by eight soldiers of the 1st Battalion, King’s Own Scottish Borderers and a Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) officer. The eleven IRA members are driven to the checkpoint in the back of a makeshift Bedford armoured dumper truck. They are armed with 7.62mm AK-47s, 5.56mm ArmaLite AR-18s, two 12.7mm DShK heavy machine-guns, RPG-7s, different kinds of grenades, and a LPO-50 flamethrower. The heavy machine guns and the flamethrower are mounted on a tripod on the lorry bed. To assure widespread destruction, the column plan to detonate a van bomb after the initial assault.
The attack takes place shortly after 4:00 PM. IRA members seal off roads leading to the checkpoint in an attempt to prevent civilians from getting caught up in the attack. The truck is driven from the border and halted at the checkpoint. As Private James Houston begins to check the back of the truck, the IRA open fire with assault rifles and throw grenades into the compound. Two RPG-7s are fired at the observation sangar while the flamethrower stream is directed at the command sangar. Heavy shooting continues as the truck reverses and smashes through the gates of the compound. At least three IRA volunteers dismount inside the checkpoint and spray the portacabins with gunfire and the flamethrower’s fire stream, while throwing grenades and nail bombs. The defenders are forced to seek shelter in sangars, from where they fire into their own base. A farmer some distance away sees an orange ball of flames and hears gunfire ‘raking the fields.’ As the truck drives out of the now wrecked compound, a red transit van loaded with a 400-lb. (182 kg) bomb is driven inside and set to detonate once the IRA unit has made its escape. However, only the booster charge explodes.
The attack is finally repulsed by a four-men Borderers section from the checkpoint that is patrolling nearby, with the support of a Westland Wessex helicopter. The patrol fires more than 100 rounds at the IRA unit. The Wessex receives gunfire and is forced to take evasive action. The IRA column, at risk of being surrounded, flee toward the border in the armoured truck. It is found abandoned at the border with a 460-lb. (210 kg) bomb on board.
Two soldiers are killed in the attack: Private James Houston (22) from England and Lance-Corporal Michael Patterson (21) from Scotland. Corporal Whitelaw is badly wounded by shrapnel and later airlifted for treatment. Another soldier suffers minor injuries.
There is outrage in Westminster and among unionists, as a supposedly well-defended border post has been overrun by the IRA and two soldiers killed. On the other hand, according to Moloney, there is also some disappointment among republicans. Despite the positive propaganda effect, the quick and strong reaction from the outpost’s defenders convince some high-ranking IRA members that the Army Council has been infiltrated by a mole.
KOSB officers and security sources believe that the IRA unit involved was not locally recruited, putting the blame instead on IRA members from Clogher, County Tyrone and South Monaghan in the Republic. The same sources say that the attack was executed “in true backside-or-bust Para style.”
After the action of Derryard, the British Army in Northern ireland are issued the French designed Luchaire 40mm rifle grenade, fitted on the muzzle of the SA80 rifle. This gives the troops a lightweight armour piercing capability to deal with the threat imposed by improvised armoured vehicles. Permanent checkpoints along the border are also fitted with general-purpose machine guns. From 1990 until the end of the IRA campaign in 1997, there are a number of further bloodless, small-scale attacks against permanent vehicle checkpoints along this part of the border using automatic weapons, particularly in County Fermanagh and against a military outpost at Aughnacloy, County Tyrone.
Two soldiers, Corporal Robert Duncan and Lance Corporal Ian Harvey, are bestowed the Distinguished Conduct Medal (DCM), while Lance-Corporal Patterson receives a posthumous mention in dispatches for his actions during the attack. The checkpoint is dismantled in March 1991, as part of a major border security re-arrangement codenamed Operation Mutilate.
(Pictured: Republican memorial at Carragunt bridge, on the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic, often crossed by Provisional IRA forces during the Troubles to attack British targets inside County Fermanagh)
The Ballygawley attack involves two IRA active service units from the East Tyrone Brigade: an armed assault unit and a bomb unit. There are also several teams of IRA observers in the area. The assault team is armed with AK-47 and AR-15 rifles, while the bombing unit is responsible for planting and detonating a 100-pound (45 kg) bomb. Both units are commanded by Patrick Kelly.
The assault is launched on Saturday, December 7, at 6:55 PM, when the handful of RUC officers manning the base are getting ready to hand over to the next shift. In the first burst of automatic fire, the two guards at the entrance are killed, Constable George Gilliland and Reserve Constable William Clements. Constable Clements’s Ruger Security-Sixrevolver is taken by the attackers. The base is then raked with gunfire. Another three RUC officers who are inside run out to the back of the base, where they hope the walls might offer some cover. IRA members go into the building and take documents and weapons. The bomb is placed inside and, upon detonation, destroys the entire base, injuring three officers.
The republican IRIS Magazine (#11, October 1987) describes the attack as follows:
“One volunteer took up a position close to the front gate. Two RUC men opened the gate and the volunteer calmly stepped forward, shooting them both dead at point blank range. Volunteers firing AK-47 and Armalite rifles moved into the barracks, raking it with gunfire. Having secured the building, they planted a 100-lb. bomb inside. The bomb exploded, totally destroying the building after the volunteers had withdrawn to safety.”
The first British Army unit to arrive at the base in the wake of the attack is X Company, 1st Battalion, Royal Regiment of Fusiliers.
The attack is one of the Provisional IRA’s biggest during this period. Twelve days later the same IRA brigade mortar the RUC station at Castlederg badly damaging the base and injuring four people. The Ballygawley base is rebuilt by the Royal Engineers in 1986.
The East Tyrone IRA launches two similar attacks in the following years: the successful attack on the Birches base in 1986, and the ill-fated attack on the Loughgall base in 1987, in which eight IRA members are killed. Ballygawley itself had seen conflict before with the Ballygawley land mine attack in 1983 and would see more violence in 1988 with the Ballygawley bus bombing, that cost the lives of eight British soldiers. The gun taken from Constable Clements is found by security forces after the SAS ambush at Loughgall.
The RUC base at Ballygawley is once again targeted by the East Tyrone Brigade on December 7, 1992, in what becomes the debut of the IRA’s brand-new Mark-15 improvised mortar, better known as “Barrack Buster.” Another attack with a horizontal mortar occurs on April 30, 1993, when a RUC mobile patrol leaving Ballygawley compound is targeted. According to an IRA statement, the projectile misses one of the vehicles, hits a wall and explodes.
(Pictured: A Provisional Irish Republican Army badge, with the phoenix symbolising the origins of the Provisional IRA)
The UDA’s Shankill headquarters is above Frizzell’s fish shop on the Shankill Road. The UDA’s Inner Council and West Belfast brigade regularly meets there on Saturdays. Peter Taylor says it is also the office of the Loyalist Prisoners’ Association (LPA), and on Saturday mornings is normally crowded, as that is when money is given to prisoners’ families. According to Henry McDonald and Jim Cusack, the IRA have had the building under surveillance for some time. They say that the IRA decides to strike when one of their scouts spots Adair entering the building on the morning of Saturday, October 23, 1993. Later, in a secretly-recorded conversation with police, Adair confirms that he had been in the building that morning.
The IRA’s Belfast Brigade launches an operation to assassinate the UDA’s top commanders, whom it believes are at the meeting. The plan allegedly is for two IRA members to enter the shop with a time bomb, force out the customers at gunpoint and flee before it explodes, killing those at the meeting. As they believe the meeting is being held in the room above the shop, the bomb is designed to send the blast upwards. IRA members maintain that they would have warned the customers as the bomb was primed. It has an eleven-second fuse, and the IRA state that this would allowed just enough time to clear the downstairs shop but not enough for those upstairs to escape.
The operation is carried out by Thomas Begley and Seán Kelly, two IRA members in their early twenties from Ardoyne. They drive from Ardoyne to the Shankill in a hijacked blue Ford Escort, which they park on Berlin Street, around the corner from Frizzell’s. Dressed as deliverymen, they enter the shop with the five-pound bomb in a holdall. It is shortly after 1:00 PM on a Saturday afternoon and the area is crowded with mostly women and children. While Kelly waits at the door, Begley makes his way through the customers towards the counter, where the bomb detonates prematurely. Forensic evidence shows that Begley had been holding the bomb over the refrigerated serving counter when it exploded. Begley is killed along with nine other people, two of them children. They are the owner John Frizzell (63), his daughter Sharon McBride (29), Leanne Murray (13), UDA member Michael Morrison (27), his partner Evelyn Baird (27) and their daughter Michelle (7), George Williamson (63) and his wife Gillian (49), and Wilma McKee (38). The force of the blast causes the old building to collapse into a pile of rubble. The upper floor comes down upon those inside the shop, crushing many of the survivors under the rubble, where they remain until rescued some hours later by volunteers and emergency services. About 57 people are injured. At the scene during the rescue operation are several senior loyalists, including Adair and Billy McQuiston. The latter had been in a pub on the nearest corner when the bomb went off. Among those rescued from the rubble is the badly-wounded Seán Kelly.
Unknown to the IRA, if a UDA meeting had taken place, it had ended early and those attending it had left the building before the bomb exploded. McDonald and Cusack state that Adair and his men had stopped using the room for important meetings, allegedly because a sympathiser within the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) told Adair that the police had it bugged.
There was great anger and outrage in the Shankill in the wake of the bombing. Billy McQuiston tells journalist Peter Taylor that “anybody on the Shankill Road that day, from a Boy Scout to a granny, if you’d given them a gun they would have gone out and retaliated.” Many Protestants see the bombing as an indiscriminate attack on them. Adair believes that the bomb was meant for him. Two days after the bombing, as Adair is driving away from his house, he stops and tells a police officer, “I’m away to plan a mass murder.”
In the week following the bombing, the UDA and UVF launch a wave of “revenge attacks,” killing 14 civilians. The UDA shoots a Catholic delivery driver in Belfast after luring him to a bogus call just a few hours after the bombing. He dies on October 25. On 26 October, the UDA shoots dead another two Catholic civilians and wounds five in an indiscriminate attack at a Council Depot on Kennedy Way, Belfast. On October 30, UDA members enter a pub in Greysteel frequented by Catholics and again open fire indiscriminately. Eight civilians, six Catholics and two Protestants, are killed and 13 are wounded. This becomes known as the Greysteel massacre. The UDA states it is a direct retaliation for the Shankill Road bombing.
Seán Kelly, the surviving IRA member, is badly wounded in the blast, having lost his left eye and is unable to move his left arm. Upon his release from hospital, however, he is arrested and convicted of nine counts of murder, each with a corresponding life sentence. In July 2000, he is released under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement. In an interview shortly after his release, he says he had never intended to kill innocent people and regrets what happened.
Doherty is the third son in a family of six. He is born on October 16, 1955, in the Andersonstown area of Belfast and is educated at St. Theresa’s Primary School and Glen Road Christian Brothers School (CBS). The Doherty brothers are known cyclists and sportsmen in the Andersontown area. He wins an AntrimGaelic football medal at minor level in 1971.
Doherty joins Fianna Éireann in 1971 and is interned by the British Government between February 1973 and November 1975. His brothers Michael and Terence are interned between 1972 and 1974.
Doherty works as an apprentice heating engineer. His girlfriend is Geraldine Scheiss and, although they never become formally engaged, they become very close toward the end of his life. Before his arrest, she had not known that he is in the IRA.
In August 1976, while he is out to set a bomb, the van in which he is riding is chased by the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC). During the chase Doherty manages to leave the van and hijack a car. He later ditches the car and is found one mile away from the car. He is convicted and sentenced to 18 years for possession of firearms and explosives, with another four years for the hijack.
Doherty starts his hunger strike on May 22, 1981. While on hunger strike, he is elected as an Anti H-Block TD for the Cavan–Monaghan constituency at the 1981 Irish general election, which is held on June 11. He receives 9,121 (15.1%) first preference votes and is elected on the fourth count. The two seats gained by Anti H-Block candidates denies TaoiseachCharles Haughey the chance to form a government, and the 22nd Dáil Éireann sees a Fine Gael–Labour Party coalition government come to office, with Garret FitzGerald as Taoiseach.
Doherty dies at the age of 25 on August 2, 1981. He lasts 73 days on hunger strike, the longest of the 1981 hunger strikers, and only one day short of Terence MacSwiney. He is the shortest-serving Dáil deputy ever, serving as a TD for only two months.
Dillon comes from an area steeped in Irish traditional music. Since she was a schoolgirl she has sung and performed. She learns local folk songs from teachers and workshops held in the town. She can also play the fiddle and whistles. At the age of 14 she wins the All-Ireland Singing Trophy at Fleadh Cheoil.
In 1991 Dillon forms a band called Óige (an Irish word meaning ‘youth’) with school friends Murrough and Ruadhrai O’Kane, bringing her take on Irish traditional songs to Ireland, Scotland and further afield. During this time she also performs with big names such as De Dannan and Phil Coulter. Óige records two albums with Dillon, a studio and a live album. Inspiration is recorded in 1992 to sell at concerts in Europe. The live album, simply called Live, is recorded at a concert in Glasgow on August 15, 1993.
Dillon leaves Óige in 1995 and joins the folk supergroup Equation, replacing Kate Rusby, and signs a record deal with Warner Music Group. She leaves Equation with original band member Sam Lakeman because of musical differences and together they immediately signed a separate deal with the same label as a duo named Polar Star. In 2001, she releases her first solo album, Cara Dillon, which features traditional songs and two original Dillon/Lakeman compositions. The album is an unexpected hit in the folk world, with Dillon receiving four nominations at the 2002 BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards. Lakeman and Dillon marry in December 2002.
In 2009, Dillon releases her fourth album, the award-winning Hill of Thieves. The record marks a return to Dillon’s traditional roots with a purer production and arrangement style. The titular track “Hill of Thieves,” a Dillon\Lakeman original, is voted by BBC listeners as one of the “Top 10” original songs to have come out of Northern Ireland. In 2012, she performs two concerts with the Ulster Orchestra.
Dillon’s fifth solo album, A Thousand Hearts, is released in 2014. Prior to the album’s release, she discovers that her music enjoys a dedicated following in China, where her first album is featured in English curriculums. She has since embarked on several popular Chinese tours. As of 2017, she continues to tour regularly and work with her husband, who backs her on piano and guitar. Her most recent release is the album, Wanderer (2017).
Dillon is the sister of fellow folk singer Mary Dillon, formerly of Déanta. Dillon and Lakeman live in Frome, Somerset, England with their three children, twin sons born in 2006 and a daughter born in 2010.
The office of the Governor of Northern Ireland is established on 9 December 9, 1922 under Letters Patent to “do and execute in due manner as respects Northern Ireland all things which by virtue of the [1920] Act and our said Letters Patent of 27 April 1921 or otherwise belonged to the office of Lord Lieutenant at the time of the passing of the Irish Free State Constitution Act 1922.”
The Governor has possession of the Great Seal of Northern Ireland and is the successor to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in Northern Ireland, itself established on May 3, 1921. The official residence of the Governor of Northern Ireland is Hillsborough Castle in County Down. Following refurbishment of the Castle, James Hamilton, 3rd Duke of Abercorn, takes up residence in 1925. It remained the official residence until the abolition of the office of governor in 1973. Henceforth it has been the official residence of the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.
Francis ‘Francie’ McPeake II, uilleann piper and singer, dies in Belfast on July 7, 1986. He is a crucial figure in preserving the great Ulster piping tradition.
McPeake is born on January 20, 1917 at 43 Malcolmson Street, Belfast, the son of Francis J. McPeake (1885–1971), piper and tram conductor, and Mary McPeake (née Loney). His father, a staunch nationalist, wins the Feis piping competition in Belfast in 1909 and represents Ireland together with a Welsh harper, John Page, at the Pan-Celtic Congress in Brussels in 1911. In July 1912 he wins first prize in the learners’ class when he attends the foundation of the Pipers’ Club in Dublin. He represents Ireland in many instances as one of relatively few pipers from Northern Ireland at the time.
McPeake continues the strong musical tradition in the family. He also plays the pipes and father and son are recorded by Peter Kennedy in 1952. They appear at the Royal Albert Hall in 1956 and later form the McPeake Trio along with his brother James, who plays the fiddle, the piano accordion, and later a harp made by McFall in Belfast. The trio comes to be known as The McPeakes. They sing in Irish and in English and are closely identified with particular songs, such as “The Jug of Punch,” “The Lament of Aughrim,” and “The Verdant Braes of Skreen,” though the one most associated with them is “Will You Go, Lassie, Go?”
The McPeakes win first prize at the international Eisteddfod in Wales in the late 1950s and acquire a strong international reputation with Bob Dylan being among their fans. The trio is later augmented by members of the next generation, recorded by Peter Kennedy again, and make several recordings, including Irish Folk (1964) and Welcome Home (1967), which is a cassette reissue of a 1962 album for the Topic Records label. Some of Kennedy’s recordings of the McPeake family are released on the compact disc Traditional Songs of Ireland (CD-SDL 411) in 1995. A fourth-generation family group follows, Clan McPeake, inheriting the commitment, much of the repertoire, and the verve of the earlier generations.
McPeakes’s gift for teaching is employed at the Francis McPeake School of Music, which is established in 1977, and he writes a well-reviewed tin whistle tutor entitled Smash the Windows, published by Appletree Press in 1981. He also forms the Clonard Traditional Music Society.
McPeake dies on July 7, 1986. The McPeake family remains closely associated with traditional music and with Belfast. The Francis McPeake International Summer School is established in 2004.
On February 26, 1983, Northern Irish footballerPat Jennings becomes the first player in English football to make 1,000 senior appearances, celebrating this milestone with a clean sheet in a goalless league draw for Arsenal at West Bromwich Albion.
Jennings is born in Newry, County Down, Northern Ireland on June 12, 1945. After playing for Shamrock Rovers‘ under-18 side at the age of 11, he concentrates on Gaelic football until he is sixteen years old, when he makes his soccer comeback with his hometown side Newry Town. After impressing with the team, he moves to English Third Division side Watford in May 1963. He again impresses in his first season in England, playing every league game for his club. He makes his international debut with the Northern Ireland national football team at the age of eighteen while playing for Watford. This game, on April 15, 1964, is a British Home Championship match against Wales, with Northern Ireland winning the game 3–2. George Best makes his international debut in the same game. Jennings is signed by Tottenham Hotspur for £27,000 in June 1964.
Jennings spends thirteen years at White Hart Lane, where he plays in 472 league games for Spurs, and 591 in all competitions. He wins the FA Cup in 1967, the League Cup in 1971 and 1973, and the UEFA Cup in 1972. In the 1967 Charity Shield he scores once from his own area, kicking the ball from his hands and sending a large punt down the field that bounces over Manchester United goalkeeper Alex Stepney and into the net. In 1973 the Football Writers’ Association names him as its footballer of the year. Three years later he wins Professional Footballers’ Association‘s version of the award, the first goalkeeper to receive this accolade, and to this date remains only one of two, along with Peter Shilton.
In August 1977, he is transferred to Tottenham’s arch-rivals, Arsenal, with Tottenham thinking he is nearing the end of his career. However, he sees off rivals for the goalkeeper’s jersey to play for Arsenal for another eight years. While at Highbury, he helps Arsenal to four Cup finals in three successive years, the FA Cup final in 1978, 1979, and 1980, as well as the European Cup Winners’ Cup final that year. However, Arsenal only manages to win the second of these finals, a 3–2 victory against Manchester United. In total, he makes 327 appearances for Arsenal, 237 of them in the League, between 1977 and his eventual retirement from first-team club football in 1985.
Despite his retirement from club football in 1985, Jennings returns to Tottenham Hotspur, playing mostly in their reserve side to maintain his match sharpness for Northern Ireland’s 1986 FIFA World Cup campaign. He plays his final international game at the 1986 World Cup, on his 41st birthday, making him at the time the World Cup’s oldest-ever participant. The match is Northern Ireland’s final group game, a 3–0 defeat against Brazil. In total, he participates in the qualifying stages of six World Cups between 1966 and 1986.
Jennings works as a goalkeeping coach at Tottenham since 1993. In 2003 he is inducted into the English Football Hall of Fame in recognition of the skills he demonstrated in the English league. He and his family have lived for many years in Broxbourne, Hertfordshire, where his son attended The Broxbourne School along with the sons of fellow Spurs players Chris Hughton, Osvaldo Ardiles and Ray Clemence. He is still associated with the Spurs and hosts Corporate Hospitality fans in the Pat Jennings Lounges at White Hart Lane and Windsor Park, Belfast.
The blast engulfs a carriage of the train in flames, killing three and injuring five others. One of the dead and the most seriously injured survivor are volunteers of the IRA. After the blast, the organisation issues a statement acknowledging responsibility, apologising to those who were harmed and state that it was ‘grave and distressing’ but an ‘accident’ caused by the ‘war situation.’
The train is a Northern Ireland Railways afternoon service carrying passengers between Ballymena railway station and Belfast Central railway station. The train is largely empty as it leaves Dunmurry railway station and enters the outskirts of Belfast, crossing under the M1 motorway on its way to Finaghy railway station shortly before 4:55 PM. A large fireball erupts in the rear carriage, bringing the train to a standstill and forcing panicked passengers to evacuate urgently as the smoke and flames spread along the train. The survivors then move down the track in single file to safety while emergency services fight the blaze. After several hours and combined efforts from fire, police and military services the blaze is contained. One fireman is treated for minor injuries. The two damaged carriages are transported to Queen’s Quay in Belfast for forensic examination and are subsequently rebuilt, one remaining in service until 2006 and the other until 2012.
Of the four persons occupying the carriage, three are killed with burns so severe that it is not possible to identify them by conventional means. Rail chief Roy Beattie describes the human remains as “three heaps of ashes.” The fourth, later identified as Patrick Joseph Flynn, is an IRA member and one of the men transporting the bombs. He suffers very serious burns to his face, torso and legs, and is reported to be close to death upon arrival at the hospital. Of the dead, two are eventually named as 17-year-old Protestant student Mark Cochrane from Finaghy and the other a 35-year-old Belfast-based accountant and recent immigrant from Lagos, Nigeria, Max Olorunda, who had been visiting a client in Ballymena. The identity of the third is harder to ascertain, but it is eventually confirmed by the IRA by their statement that he is 26-year-old IRA member Kevin Delaney. In addition to the fireman, four people are injured, including Flynn, two teenagers treated for minor injuries and an older man who suffers much more serious burns.
Further bomb alerts are issued across the region and two similar devices are discovered on trains, at York Road railway station in Belfast and at Greenisland railway station. Both are removed safely, and control detonated. The devices are simple incendiary bombs similar to that which exploded south of Befast, consisting of a 5-lb. block of explosives attached to a petrol can with a simple time device intended to delay the explosion until the train is empty that evening. Later testimony indicates that Delaney armed the first of two bombs and placed it beside him as he picked up the second one. As he arms this device, the first bomb suddenly detonates for reasons that remain unknown. Delaney is killed instantly and his accomplice, Patrick Joseph Flynn, is forced to leap from the train in flames. Flynn is guarded by police in hospital and arrested once his wounds heal sufficiently.
The IRA releases a lengthy statement about the event, terming it a ‘bombing tragedy,’ blaming the Royal Ulster Constabulary for their ‘sickening and hypocritical … collective activity of collaboration with the British forces.’ In Britain, ConservativeMPWinston Churchill calls for the death penalty to be reinstated for terrorists as a result of the incident.
Patrick Flynn is tried at Belfast Crown Court for double manslaughter and possession of explosives after he recovers from his injuries. He is severely disfigured and badly scarred from the extensive burns the incendiary device had inflicted upon him. The judge is asked and agrees to take this into account for sentencing after reviewing the evidence and finding Flynn guilty due to his proximity to the explosion, his known IRA affiliation and the discovery of telephone numbers for the Samaritans and Belfast Central railway station in his jacket, to be used to telephone bomb warnings. Justice Kelly sentences Flynn to ten years in prison for each manslaughter as well as seven years for the explosives offences, to be served concurrently.
seamus dubhghaill 