"We are unemployed, hopefully we will be here till Christmas, we will have to see what happens," said one of the angry but not totally surprised workers at Tellabs.
He said the rumours of the closure began on Monday, but were only confirmed to the workforce at lunchtime yesterday when management called a mass meeting to break the news that they would be out of work from December 31st.
"Three weeks ago we were told everything was fine and today, out of the blue, we were told we were going. They knew two weeks ago but didn't tell us and in the meeting today they had no answers for our questions," said another man.
With the anger there was an air of resignation, a feeling that Drogheda is always in the news for the wrong reason.
Ironically, the last major inward investment by an overseas company in the town was last August, when Tellabs said it was spending $10 million (€10.9 million) on a new production line and would be recruiting an additional 150 staff.
"It is always Drogheda that loses out," said one worker who left another multinational in Drogheda to work for Tellabs last July.
The lack of an IDA landbank until recently has left Drogheda off the shortlist of possible locations, according to some observers. The town has had to watch while companies have chosen Dundalk or north county Dublin as a base instead.
They argue that Drogheda is in a good location, and when the Drogheda bypass is completed next year, it is said that it will reduce the journey between Dublin and the border at peak times by up to 30 minutes.
"We are in urgent need of a taskforce that will do something for the town, not just talk about it. The jobs in Tellabs are in addition to those in the technology sector in Dundalk and North Dublin which have also affected Drogheda," said Mr Gerry Floyd, secretary of the Drogheda Council of Trade Unions.
Recent figures from the Central Statistics Office show that the number of people on the live register in Drogheda in July was 2523, an increase of 257 on June and an increase of 93 on the same period last year.
Mr John Kohler, senior vice-president of Tellabs global manufacturing, said the exact situation on severance will be clarified in coming days.
