As a search resumes in Galway Bay today for a 32-year-old woman reported missing yesterday, the second swimmer who died off Silver Strand near Barna has been named as well-known musician Johnny Duhan.
The young woman, who was from a well known family just beyond An Spideil, was a regular swimmer and it is believed she may have tried to assist Mr Duhan when he got into difficulty.
Duhan (74), best known as the composer of The Voyage, sung by Christy Moore, wrote music performed by Mary Black, Dolores Keane, Eleanor Shanley and The Dubliners, among others. He began his career as frontman for the beat group, Granny’s Intentions.
The father of five, who also published several books, was originally from Limerick but had been living in Barna, Co Galway for some years.
Moore has described him as “one of our greatest songwriters”.
In a notice on RIP.ie, his family said that on November 12th he “met his untimely death while taking his daily swim in Galway Bay”.
His body was recovered at 1.40pm on Tuesday by the RNLI Aran island lifeboat after the alert was raised shortly before 10am.
It was after this search was initiated that Gardaí became aware that a second swimmer had failed to return to her car at Silver Strand. Both swimmers had gone out separately.
While seas were calm, a dense fog had covered Galway and Barna throughout Tuesday.
The foggy conditions precluded the Irish Coast Guard Shannon rescue helicopter from joining the search which was co-ordinated by the Irish Coast Guard’s Marine Rescue Sub Centre in Valentia in support of the Garda.
Costelloe Bay Coast Guard boat, Galway Bay RNLI,the Civil Defence and Galway Sub-Aqua Club assisted in the search yesterday, along with local fishermen, sailors and kayakers familiar with the area.
