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Thinking Inside the Box is Theme of New Ilen Marine School Project in Limerick

24th November 2020
Trading ship, sailing ship, school ship – the Ilen goes about her business in Kilrush, County Clare Trading ship, sailing ship, school ship – the Ilen goes about her business in Kilrush, County Clare Credit: Gary Mac Mahon

The restored 1926-built 56ft Limerick trading ketch Ilen's project of education through action and involvement continues to be developed with the Ilen Marine School's Community and Cargo 2020-21 Programme. Transportation of cargo to coastal communities was the original purpose of the traditionally-rigged flagship and "Floating Classroom" Ilen. Consequently, late last year - pre-pandemic - the Ilen Project's management under the direction of Gary MacMahon decided to revitalise her seaborne cargo trade, which had come to an end sometime in the early 1980s.

They planned to do this by facilitating trade between local food and beverage producers out from six ports on the south and west coasts of Ireland. The Community and Cargo 2020 voyage unfolded over two weeks in August - fourteen happy days during which the Ilen ship's company somehow found safe passage-making time between two unseasonal storms and two unprecedented lockdowns.

 Ilen making good speed under sailDoing what she does best – Ilen making good speed under sail. Photo: Gary Mac Mahon

Ilen making good speed under sailThe dream fulfilled – Ilen finds favourable weather

The seaborne cargo voyage was a very tangible and successful dimension of the Community and Cargo 2020 programme. It was well-matched by the engagement with the schools on land, with children handling the crates of produce and being thrilled at the thought of cargo coming to them from over the waves.

Recently in a follow-up, the first three Limerick City schools each received a delivery of Ilen's Community and Cargo boxes. This delivery was the first step in a socially-distanced Ilen Marine School Educational Programme, which has been designed to meet with schools and HSE policies around COVID 19. In essence, this programme allows us to continue the very popular schools involvement rolled out in the previous term.

One of the new cargo boxes is welcomed to Our Lady of Lourdes Primary School in LimerickOne of the new cargo boxes is welcomed to Our Lady of Lourdes Primary School in Limerick. Other schools involved in the initial stage of filling the boxes with relevant material include Scoil Iosagain CBS Primary School, and Presentation Primary School, both in Limerick

The new Ilen Marine School Cargo Boxes are attractive pieces of work in their own right……..The new Ilen Marine School Cargo Boxes are attractive pieces of work in their own right……..

and each box arrives with Instruction Pack and videos………and each box arrives with Instruction Pack and videos

Following on from this, the programme will continue to develop with the contents of a cargo box despatched for delivery under sail onboard Ilen to another school up or down the coast, depending on how direct relationship between schools are being fostered in the coming weeks.

There was visible excitement as the eventually outgoing cargo boxes arrived at their respective schools, with swiftly conveyance to their classroom settings for packing, The cargo box comes with a teacher's guide packet (digital and printed) which contains:

  • - Instructions and scripts for each activity.
  • - Class videos to watch on each activity.
  • - A digital database in Google Classroom, accessible to all the teachers for ease 
of access to supporting material.
  • - Four activities that guide the student and teachers through a creative process 
which takes them into the watery world of cargo trade and sailing tradition. 


The programme, as it moves forward, will host three online virtual zoom sessions designed to facilitate the making of new relationships between participating schools. Moreover, the programme should stir pupils' imagination, both in the classroom and at home, as the needs of the two different learning settings have been taken into account. 
It's an imaginative project which is proving to be a mutually educational project both for the crew of the Ilen Marine School, and the schoolchildren and teachers involved.

Ilen departs Foynes on her cargo voyage. It was on Foynes Island in the winter of 1925-26 that Ilen was designed by Conor O'BrienIlen departs Foynes on her cargo voyage. It was on Foynes Island in the winter of 1925-26 that Ilen was designed by Conor O'Brien. Photo: Deirdre Power

Published in Ilen
WM Nixon

About The Author

WM Nixon

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William M Nixon has been writing about sailing in Ireland for many years in print and online, and his work has appeared internationally in magazines and books. His own experience ranges from club sailing to international offshore events, and he has cruised extensively under sail, often in his own boats which have ranged in size from an 11ft dinghy to a 35ft cruiser-racer. He has also been involved in the administration of several sailing organisations.

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Ireland's Trading Ketch Ilen

The Ilen is the last of Ireland’s traditional wooden sailing ships.

Designed by Limerick man Conor O’Brien and built in Baltimore in 1926, she was delivered by Munster men to the Falkland Islands where she served valiantly for seventy years, enduring and enjoying the Roaring Forties, the Furious Fifties, and Screaming Sixties.

Returned now to Ireland and given a new breath of life, Ilen may be described as the last of Ireland’s timber-built ocean-going sailing ships, yet at a mere 56ft, it is capable of visiting most of the small harbours of Ireland.

Wooden Sailing Ship Ilen FAQs

The Ilen is the last of Ireland’s traditional wooden sailing ships.

The Ilen was designed by Conor O’Brien, the first Irish man to circumnavigate the world.

Ilen is named for the West Cork River which flows to the sea at Baltimore, her home port.

The Ilen was built by Baltimore Sea Fisheries School, West Cork in 1926. Tom Moynihan was foreman.

Ilen's wood construction is of oak ribs and planks of larch.

As-built initially, she is 56 feet in length overall with a beam of 14 feet and a displacement of 45 tonnes.

Conor O’Brien set sail in August 1926 with two Cadogan cousins from Cape Clear in West Cork, arriving at Port Stanley in January 1927 and handed it over to the new owners.

The Ilen was delivered to the Falkland Islands Company, in exchange for £1,500.

Ilen served for over 70 years as a cargo ship and a ferry in the Falkland Islands, enduring and enjoying the Roaring Forties, the Furious Fifties, and Screaming Sixties. She stayed in service until the early 1990s.

Limerick sailor Gary McMahon and his team located Ilen. MacMahon started looking for her in 1996 and went out to the Falklands and struck a deal with the owner to bring her back to Ireland.

After a lifetime of hard work in the Falklands, Ilen required a ground-up rebuild.

A Russian cargo ship transported her back on a 12,000-mile trip from the Southern Oceans to Dublin. The Ilen was discharged at the Port of Dublin 1997, after an absence from Ireland of 70 years.

It was a collaboration between the Ilen Project in Limerick and Hegarty’s Boatyard in Old Court, near Skibbereen. Much of the heavy lifting, of frames, planking, deadwood & backbone, knees, floors, shelves and stringers, deck beams, and carlins, was done in Hegarty’s. The generally lighter work of preparing sole, bulkheads, deck‐houses fixed furniture, fixtures & fittings, deck fittings, machinery, systems, tanks, spar making and rigging is being done at the Ilen boat building school in Limerick.

Ten years. The boat was much the worse for wear when it returned to West Cork in May 1998, and it remained dormant for ten years before the start of a decade-long restoration.

Ilen now serves as a community floating classroom and cargo vessel – visiting 23 ports in 2019 and making a transatlantic crossing to Greenland as part of a relationship-building project to link youth in Limerick City with youth in Nuuk, west Greenland.

At a mere 56ft, Ilen is capable of visiting most of the small harbours of Ireland.

©Afloat 2020