Each year in Ireland, Duchas (the Heritage Service) runs a series of events throughout the country, under the banner 'Heritage Week'. This is a major project involving many national and community organisations - the aim of which is to keep Ireland's history alive and accessible to people at home and abroad with an interest in our cultural past.

Here in the Finn Valley, this year's Heritage Week kicked off on Sunday 1st September from the Isaac Butt Heritage Centre, Cloghan, with a hill-walking trip to the nearby Blue Stack Mountains - scene of a noteworthy event which took place during World War II. On a January night in 1944, a British Airforce plane crashed on the Blue Stack range, killing seven crew members outright. Miraculously, the remaining five survived to tell the extraordinary tale.

Like the 'Titanic' story (albeit on a far lesser scale), the events of that night long ago have continued to fascinate people down through the years - drawing them like a magnet to see the crash site for themselves.

For the benefit of those people with no prior awareness of the tragedy - or those unable to make the trip and who may find it of interest - our webmaster made the six/seven hour round-trip to bring you a pictorial view of the climb and the crash-site, where many bits of the plane remain to this day. The actual gun turret can now be seen in St Connell's Museum, Glenties. Click here for details of the Museum.

View of the Blue Stack Mountains from the Wind Farms, Cloghan.