Sir, - I was intrigued by Brendan McWilliams's "Weather Eye" feature on May 9th about the mysterious booms heard occasionally at sea, particularly on warm summer days, and known as the "Barisal Guns".
I can recall hearing similar booms on a number of different days as a child while enjoying a visit to the seaside. This would have been in the late 1930s to early 1940s, when one would have been lucky to get as far as Booterstown or Blackrock on Dublin's southside.
I was scared that it was thunder but my father assured me that it was possibly a fog-warning device on the Kish lighthouse in Dublin Bay. He speculated that on such days it would operate to alert ships of its presence as the lighthouse could not be seen because of a local sea mist.
My father, a seaman all his life, was on one of his rare visits home, and I had no reason to doubt what he told me.
But was he wrong on this one? Perhaps the booms were the mysterious "Barisal Guns" and I would be curious to know if anyone else heard the booms in the past and if they still echo out across Dublin Bay and elsewhere on warm and humid summer days. - Yours, etc.,
BRENDAN McREDMOND,
Hazelbrook Road,
Terenure,
Dublin 6.