Mary O'Rourke has got to believe someone up there has put a hex on her. It was bad enough losing the high-profile chairman of Telecom Eireann, Brian Thompson, just after he took up the post and shortly before flotation of what is now Eircom. She then lost his predecessor Ron Bolger, who had stepped aside to accommodate Mr Thompson only to see himself left out in the cold when Ray MacSharry was appointed over him.

Badly bruised from the subsequent poor performance of Eircom, she now faces into only the second mass-flotation of a State company with the loss of another highly-regarded executive. The resignation of Garry Cullen 16 months into his tenure as chief executive of the airline and, again, months before a planned flotation, will dent already shaky investor confidence, temporarily at least, in this latest effort to offload a State asset.

With her current run of luck, what odds would one get on sudden changes at the top of other privatisation targets like ESB, Aer Rianta and Coillte?