GARDAÍ ARE worried that a feud is escalating between Traveller families in Co Limerick, following the discovery of a pipe bomb at the weekend.
The device was found at around 10am on Saturday, wrapped in plastic in a gully near a house in Rathkeale, in west Limerick.
Gardaí recovered the crude device after receiving a tip-off. The “viable” device would have caused serious injury or death if it had been detonated, gardaí said.
An army explosive ordnance disposal unit from Cork carried out a controlled explosion and made safe the area – known as the Five Crosses Road – at around 3pm. Residents in a nearby estate were evacuated.
While this was done the entrance to Rathkeale from the Limerick City side was closed by gardaí for about four hours.
“The device will be taken to the forensic laboratory in Garda headquarters in Dublin for further tests,” said Insp Eamon O’Neil, of Askeaton Garda station.
“It was a viable device,” said Det Supt Jim Browne of Henry Street Garda station.
“It’s not something you’d expect to hear of an afternoon in Rathkeale and it’s not welcome either. It’s been quiet here for a long time now,” said a local man who wished to remain anonymous.
Many members of the Travelling community own homes in Rathkeale. There have been two pipe bomb attacks in the town in the past two years. Local sources say a dispute between three families in Rathkeale has escalated in recent weeks.
In a separate incident last week, three men from the Travelling community were shot at as they sat in their car in the neighbouring town of Askeaton.