Surface oil pollution on River Shannon

Footage has emerged of what appears to be a considerable amount of surface oil floating on the River Shannon in the centre of Athlone today.

The oil was captured on video this afternoon by our cameraman and can be seen both north and south of the town bridge here:

This incident appears at this stage to be significantly less serious than the major incident in August 2019 when an oil slick covered an area of approximately half a mile down stream from the Shannon bridge.

Council staff believed it originated in the Al River, where a boom was deployed.

The incident resulted in extensive damage to wildlife and to habitats.

An investigation subsequently by Westmeath County Council was unable to identify the source of the pollution.