Airplanes over Derry

Shrine 21: when Inishowen became Paris. Location: 55.037622, -7.302966 Pedants out there may note we're into another jurisdiction, but as we are five fields from Donegal and in light of the fact that the concept being honoured - human endeavour and bravery - is far bigger than a border, we'll let it stand. On the morning of May 20, 1932 the flight pioneer set off from Harbour Grace, Newfoundland with the intention of flying to Paris in her single engine Lockheed Vega 5b to emulate Charles Lindbergh's solo flight. After a flight lasting 14 hours, 56 minutes during which she contended with strong northerly winds, icy conditions and mechanical problems. To cap all this, petrol had started to trickle down her neck so Earhart made an emergency landing in a pasture at Ballyarnett near the banks of Lough Foyle, a far cry from her intended landing site of gay Paris. In a masterly stroke of understated smalltalk, a farm hand who'd witnessed the landing asked, "Have you flown far?" Amelia replied crisply "From America". The site now is the home of a small museum, the Amelia Earhart Centre, but it's now shut (and it looked it when last checked) so read up on this fascinating woman before making the pilgrimage here. Earhart was to be declared dead in absentia on the 5th of January 1937 after another courageous flight ended in mystery when it disappeared without trace. Narrator: the late Sean McMahon tells us of of not one, but three sets of aerial visitors to Derry from 1931 to 1941, two benign, one murderous!