A DISAGREEMENT HAS emerged between Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien, Dublin Airport and Ryanair as the Minister expressed his view that planes coming and going from Dublin Airport have been flying outside of agreed flight paths.

Both Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) and Ryanair have said this is not the case.

Since the opening of Dublin Airport’s North Runway last year, residents who unexpectedly found themselves under the flight path have been calling on the government to intervene and force the routes to be changed.

Back in August, the operator of Dublin airport, DAA, was given six weeks to comply with the planning permission for the night-time summer flight schedule for the airport’s new North Runway.

Before that, the Planning Authority at the council investigated alleged breaches after the opening of the airport’s North Runway last year prompted a series of noise complaints from nearby residents.

In a report by RTÉ’s Prime Time into the issue earlier this week, some residents said it feels like living in a “warzone” – with the flights overhead sending an earthquake-like tremor through their home.

Speaking to The Journal, Minister O’Brien – who is a TD for the Fingal area where the airport is located – said it is his view that the airport is “using flight paths that weren’t agreed”.

As Housing Minister, O’Brien is responsible under law for planning applications and therefore cannot comment on live planning issues and is limited in what he can say in relation to Dublin Airport.

However, he did say that he has met with impacted residents and although he has “always supported the development of the airport”, it needs to operate under the “good neighbour principle”.

“You can’t go outdoors at the moment in some areas,” O’Brien said, referring to the noise of overhead planes.

“The concern that has been raised to me by a lot of constituents in affected areas is that the flight paths as are being operated are not as were granted.

“That situation needs to be addressed and I think can be addressed,” he said.

The Minister said there were significant problems at the very start of the North Runway development and said he himself noticed planes flying outside of the agreed flight paths.

“I’ve grown up here, we always know there’s an element of noise, right? People are used to that,” he said.

However, he said the issue is that despite the “extensive public consultation over a long number of years”, residents who would have looked at the published flight paths are now feeling the impact of flights operating contrary to this.

“That’s not the approach that should be taken,” O’Brien said.

Despite this, O’Brien said he is confident that the situation can be resolved.

“The airport has been and is really important for this constituency, for jobs, for investment, and it’s important for the state, crucially important. And we want to make sure that continues.

“Having said that, I’ve always said the airport has to operate under the good neighbor principle and they have to operate under the planning conditions that have been put in place under the planning application or under the planning permission that’s granted,” O’Brien said.

He added that as the airport continues to grow, residents cannot be ignored and he welcomed the engagement by the chief executive of the DAA with impacted communities.

The North Runway was first proposed in 2004. During the process that followed, a scheme was opened by DAA to pay for special insulation to be installed nearby properties where noise levels were expected to be an issue and a buyout option for homeowners was established for homeowners who wished to move away. 

O’Brien told The Journal that he would like to see this programme continue and for the terms of it to be improved.

In response to a request from The Journal, a DAA spokesperson said: 

“The flight paths being flown today are consistent with the indicative flight paths that were shown at public information sessions held in 2016. These well-advertised sessions were open to all interested parties, including local politicians.

“The paths which aircraft fly when taking off from North Runway were developed and designed by experts to align with both planning conditions and also international safety regulations. They were subsequently examined in detail and approved by the Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) in its role as regulator.”

Ryanair’s view

In a statement published yesterday, Ryanair criticised RTÉ’s Prime Time’s report on the noise issues. 

It claimed that the report was “largely based on false claims” and “unverified hearsay claims made by a tiny number of residents in Ashbourne, Portmarnock, and Saint Margaret’s.”

Ryanair directly contradicted the Minister’s claim that planes were flying outside of agreed flight paths. 

Ryanair’s CEO Eddie Wilson said: “RTE wrongly reported that Dublin Airport flight paths were not the ones that were originally approved by Finglas County Council, despite Dublin Airport correcting this factual error on camera.”