Pioneering low-cost carrier Norwegian Airlines has announced the end of its $99 flights to Ireland. While the news is no surprise from an airline that almost exclusively depended on the indefinitely grounded Boeing 737-MAX (following two identical full-hull losses in quick succession with two different airlines), the decision to end flights from Cork and Dublin sends more than economic repercussions. For the Irish diaspora living in RI and southern New England, the move means that another precious tie to their homeland is forever snipped.
Brian, 35, is from Drogheda, an ancient riverport north of Dublin. Brian has been living in RI for three years, working on the telephone poles during the day and cheering on his childhood team, Liverpool, at night. Home is now Cranston, his time zone EST, but for Brian’s parents back in County Louth, the announcement means they are now more disconnected from their son than ever before.
“They’re not happy, they’re disappointed,” explains Brian on a rare break from work. “They liked the convenience and the price.” Now, he wonders if they will ever make it over to visit again.
Money can be scare in Ireland. Out of a population of 5 million, 760,000 are considered to be living in poverty. The national median income is $25,310 and average monthly rent is $1,692; spending upward of $500 on plane fares is simply out of the question. But Brian and his family also typify the Irish sense of pragmatism, a cultural marker borne from centuries of resilience in the face of atrocity: “If the plane is not safe to fly,” he shrugs, “what can you do?”
But not all are that phlegmatic. In the north of Ireland, 163 miles from Dublin Airport sits the isolated coastal town of Portrush. Battered by the wild storms of the North Atlantic Ocean, Portrush is set amid gnarly, plunging cliffs and ragged verdant fields dotted with sheep. This is where “Game of Thrones” was filmed, as well as the setting of the 2019 Open. But when the cameras stopped rolling and the last tee was removed, Portrush returned to being a tiny community on the very edge of civilization. No major airport will ever be built here, nothing to connect it with the outside world, and for one mother, the loss of flights from PVD means the likelihood of her seeing her son ever again is slim.
Shari, 65, became a widow in 2012. Her children had already flown the coop to forge new lives – and hopefully fortunes – in England. Life was already lonely without the brood, but when her son left for the US following the death of her husband, Shari found herself more alone than ever. A gregarious, sociable spirit who found great meaning in motherhood, Shari moved to back to Portrush in the hope that the town she was raised in would offer some solace. But all she found was greater distance and even more ghosts.
“When I first heard that Norwegian was offering flights from Belfast Airport, a comfortable drive from my home, to Providence, I was overjoyed. While the Atlantic still separated me and my son, it suddenly became more easily crossed.” Shari pauses as her voice begins to crack. “Then the Belfast flights ceased and I had to navigate the much longer trip to Dublin; but at least drew comfort from a short trip for my son to pick me up from Providence. When I heard that the Dublin flights to Providence were to cease, I just felt devastation.”
And the sense of devastation is felt on both sides of the Atlantic. Back in RI, a population of American citizens who fell in love with Irish immigrants are also feeling the impact. Victoria, 32, met her Irish fiancé in 2016, but negotiating the cultural divide isn’t always straightforward. Having direct access to the Emerald Isle eased the education and acclimation process, but the opportunity to understand more about her partner’s upbringing and culture is now far more complicated.
“It makes it difficult to meet and know more of his family; makes it even more difficult to see where he grew up,” she explains. “It’s hard enough to scrape the money together for domestic flights, but the opportunity to fly to Ireland and connect to other places in Europe, to see his friends across the continent… the option simply isn’t there anymore.”
The state’s Irish-American organizations agree. Jeremiah Nash of the Old Irish Social Club in PVD is a native of Munster, in southwest Ireland, and has not taken the news well.
“Since the grounding of the flights, it’s been a disgrace. A friend of mine was the Grand Marshal of the St. Patrick’s Parade in Athlone and they grounded the planes right before everyone went home.” But that’s not Nash’s only concern: “The Irish students in Providence now find it hard to get home for the holidays because they can’t afford the more expensive flights. I used to go home to Kerry two or three times a year … now I’m not sure when I’ll go home.”
From East Providence to Drogheda, all these stories are grounded by one consistent theme: the impact of corporate decision-making ripples wide and it ripples deep. When Boeing decided to modernize its venerable 737, rather than create a brand new aircraft, it created a shortcut to disaster. A new aircraft would have cost exponentially more and taken many years longer to develop, so Boeing decided to treat the vastly different 737 MAX as an update on the old model. There are myriad software and physical differences between the models, and when pilots used to conventional 737s took the controls, they found themselves in an alien land. Training was insufficient, and when Lion Air flight 610 crashed in October 2018 and Ethiopian Airlines flight 302 five months later, the total loss of life was a result of the exact same causes. The MAX was then grounded by the Federal Aviation Authority, and airlines like Norwegian began to hemorrhage millions of dollars. Game over.
In Ireland and for Irish people living across the world, the losses caused by Boeing are far less devastating than those suffered by the victims of Flights 610 and 302, but the repercussions are still felt, and bring with them their own sense of pain. The isolation is real, and it is acutely felt on both sides of the ocean.
As Shari explained on long-distance call between Portrush and Pawtucket: “As a senior and widowed woman, long- distance travel is challenging. Now Boeing’s corporate greed is adding to that physical and emotional challenge, causing further sadness, frustration and disappointment by being more removed from my beloved son.”
