After the long wait in Cobh, there was yet more waiting in Clare for four of the sailors from the Dominican Republic who were due to leave the State yesterday. The sailors had to spend the night in a hotel near Shannon Airport. The four were refused entry to the US by the US immigration facility at Shannon because they did not have valid visas.
These were eventually obtained through the US embassy in Dublin yesterday afternoon. A fifth man, who had a valid visa, was allowed through. The men had been stranded without pay in Cobh when the sale of tugboats by a Panamanian shipping company fell through.
Mr Jose Luis Severino, a deckhand, said he had been told on entering the State he would spend 15 days here. It turned out to be 15 months. A single man, he said he had spent the time without money, without women and without love. The four men are due to leave on a flight to New York this morning for a connection to Santo Domingo.
The wait has perhaps been worst for Mr Epi Fanio Ribota, a father of four young children, and Mr Franciso Lahoz, a grandfather, who have been so long away from their families.
But they had left their hearts in Ireland, they said, and they looked forward to returning in more normal circumstances.