The Echo is shortlisted for three media awards

THE ECHO has been nominated for three major awards at the Local Ireland/National Lottery Media Awards 2019.

Reporter Sarah Horgan is up for News Story of the Year; Downtown’s Jazz Festival special is up for Best Supplement, and our coverage of the blizzard last March is up for Best Designed Front Page.

“We are immensely proud of our team and delighted about these nominations,” Maurice Gubbins, editor of The Echo, said. “They are a recognition of our commitment to high-quality journalism in Cork.”

Ms Horgan’s nominated story last September covered Helen O’Driscoll’s call for her family’s former council house in Charleville to be demolished after the death of three of her sons in a murder-suicide in 2014. 

Her nine-year-old twins were stabbed to death by their older brother who later died by suicide. 

The article shared Ms O’Driscoll’s story and explored her family’s Traveller traditions.

“It needs to be knocked so my boys can go to God,” Ms O’Driscoll told The Echo. “It was a tradition in the travelling community that you burned the barrel-top wagon that the person died in.

“If I got news that the house was going to be knocked, I’d be the happiest woman alive.”

The nominated front page, ‘Whiteout Hits Cork’ from March 1, 2018, featured a stunning picture of Cobh blanketed in snow, shot by Aaron Woods. The Downtown Jazz Festival special last October featured pages of previews for Cork’s biggest weekend of the year.