Cork Mega Port Series

20th May 2014

TV3’s recent documentary series Cork Mega Port was another affirmation of the greatness of Cork. For Corkoholics like ourselves it was nothing short of Cork porn. 

Four hour-long episodes tracked the comings and goings that take place in the world’s second biggest harbour -  from the challenging job of piloting cruise ships into Cobh to the gantry operators at Tivoli and the Maritime College at Ringaskiddy – all giving viewers around the country an even bigger sense of how important Cork is to Ireland’s economy as its primary port.
 

Occaionsally pilots get a treat when they bring tall ships like this into Cork

Cork receives over 2,500 vessels a year including 60 cruise ships making it the nation’s pivotal import and export point as well as heaping dosh from brightly coloured anoraked visitors into the pockets of businesses and their employees.
 

The Wes Gesa unloading its weekly haul from Rotterdam at Tivoli

Everyone featured in the documentary can be proud of how they represented Cork on de telly – lots of salt-of-the-earth characters showing that Cork’s friendly charm, so sought after by tourists, starts with the very first encounters with Corkonians who board their shiny white cruise liners. No langballs here.

Now of course, every man-child in the county wants a bash off the high speed pilot launch or a garry on one of those impressive giant cranes that pluck goods from the steely holds of ships. If the Port of Cork announced trips for the public on one of its vessels that featured in the series there’d be a queue out to Roches Point!
 

We could have told them.

The production company Goldhawk Media have shone a much needed light on one of Ireland’s most important assets and it has struck PROC Central Command Committee (the lads who get together to plan the revolution every Saturday night except if they’ve a match on Sunday mornings) that the loss of the port, or even a simple blockade of Roches Point by as little as a stag party in kayaks, would cripple the Irish economy. Notes have been taken for future shenanigans - we’ll say no more!

TV3 is upping its Irish content and this is good to see especially if it means more light shining on the Cork. In the past if you weren’t into celebrities and British soap operas, TV3 was a seldom visited port.
 

A year's supply of Murphy's or half an hour driving this beauty?

Why a British production company was hired to produce the programme instead of an Irish one in world with a perpetually diminishing RTE budget is unknown – maybe the station believes they are too Dublin-centric? Regardless, in focussing more on the untapped stories of Cork TV3 has found a safe and friendly harbour.

As well as the simple but striking insight into the logistics of what happens on the river, a mystery to many Corkonians, the series also opened us up to a ship load of interesting characters including our favourite, the endearing tug boat skipper Noel Fitzgerald.
 

Tug skipper Noel Fitzgerald

The north Corkman’s old-worldly shirt-and-tie sincerity coupled with the humility and humour in which he approaches difficult, and sometimes dangerous, work has transformed our appreciation of what these Corkonians do for the local and national economy. They take their job seriously but refuse to take themselves in the same way, buoy.

The old saying was never truer: if Ireland was a bottle it would sink without a Cork.  

For more info on Cork's port activity check out: www.portofcork.ie 

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ps: The Cork Megaport series is still available on the TV3 online player if you haven’t seen it. Might be a bit over presumptuous to assume it will get a worldwide cinema release even though we know it would clean up.