THIS WEEK, A six-part podcast made by TheJournal.ie about the 1981 Stardust disaster won a prestigious gold medal at the New York Festivals Radio Awards.
First released in October 2019, the podcast tells the story of one of the worst tragedies in modern Irish history.
The Stardust fire was so significant not only because of the scale of the loss of life but also what is seen as the botched attempt by the State to deliver justice. Forty-eight young people, most of them teenagers, were killed at the Stardust disco in Dublin in the early hours of the morning on 14 February 1981, and over 200 more were wounded.
The podcast looks at what happens when a community never gets closure after a massive tragedy and how the Irish State got its handling of the fire so wrong.
It features testimonies from people there on the night – the patrons of the club and the emergency services as well as the bereaved families who lost loved ones in the fire.
Stardust won gold in the category of Best Narrative/Documentary Podcast, where it was nominated alongside podcasts from Bloomberg, ESPN, Sky News and The Washington Post, among others, at the New York Festivals Radio Awards.
The annual New York Festivals Radio Awards recognise audio content across all platforms from radio stations, networks, and independent producers from around the world.
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