A St Patrick’s Day miracle

Sir, – I think it is time, once and for all, to dispel the myth, perpetuated annually, that half a million people will attend the St Patrick’s Day parade (News, February 22nd).

A simple bit of maths tells you that on the basis of two people per metre, on both sides of the street, on the official march route distance of 2.5 kilometres, that the crowd would need to be 50 people deep at all points.

I think the notion of St Patrick banishing all the snakes from Ireland is infinitely more believable than those figures. – Yours, etc,

BARRY KELLY,