Echo boy Dave delighted after lost walking aid is replaced following US flight

ECHO BOY Dave Hogan has said he is “absolutely delighted” with the prompt decision by Aer Lingus to replace his walking aid, lost in transit between Houston and Cork Airport.

Lost luggage would be a nightmare for any holidaymaker, but for most, this pertains an inconvenience at most.

For Mr Hogan, who has limited mobility, the loss of his walking aid on his flight home to Cork after visiting Texas was a disaster.

The Farranree native has been selling newspapers, a job he loves, for 44 years, overcoming cerebral palsy to become an Echo Boy at 10 years of age.

However, he cannot get around without his walking aid.

“When I waited six hours in Cork Airport on Tuesday afternoon and I realised my walking aid was lost, my heart just sank,” he said.

“I spoke with Vincent, who works for Aer Lingus, and he was really helpful to me, and he said he’d do his best to sort me out, and he gave me a voucher for a meal and paid for a taxi to get me home.”

Two days later Mr Hogan received a call on Thursday afternoon to say a brand new walking aid was waiting for him at Phelan’s pharmacy on the Kinsale Road.

Mr Hogan said he wanted to thank Vincent and his colleagues in Aer Lingus, and Chris of courier company OCS, for all of their kindness in looking after him.

Mr Hogan has long been a beloved part of Cork’s daily life, selling The Echo and The Irish Examiner (and at Christmas the Holly Bough) outside the GPO on Oliver Plunkett Street, calling out “Echooooo!” in what has been known, for 130 years, as the song of the city.

PUBLIC RECOGNITION FOR WELL-KNOWN DAVE

Last month, he became outgoing Lord Mayor Cllr Colm Kelleher’s final official visitor to City Hall, and when Mr Hogan was flying to Houston for his holiday visiting his sister Tracey, someone on the British Airways cabin crew recognised him from The Echo’s story about that visit and bumped him up to business class (both ways).

Later, on the return flight from Heathrow, the Aer Lingus cabin crew “shamed” him, as he jokingly put it, into calling “Echooooo!” over the public address system.

“One of them gave me a microphone and she dared me to do it, and I said ‘You don’t need to dare me at all girl,’ and I got a massive round of applause afterwards,” he said.

A spokesperson for Aer Lingus said the company was aware of widespread disruption across many airports, most notably London Heathrow, Amsterdam and Paris, and among third party suppliers.

“These issues are outside of our control but are resulting in some customers experiencing a level of service below what they expect, including delayed baggage.

“We apologise to Mr Hogan for the inconvenience this has caused.”