AT last!  The classic “All you ever wanted to know about the Corrib gas controversy but were afraid to ask” has arrived.  A new book by Lorna Siggins, the Western Correspondent of the Irish Times, will be launched today, October 5.  It is an important date in the Corrib calendar because, finally, there is a book that contains the whole controversy between its covers.  It includes almost ten pages of a Timeline.  The Timeline opens with 1996: Gas discovery reported off Mayo by Enterprise Energy Ireland (EEI), and ends on 24 August 2010: Bord Pleanála hearing into last section of pipeline re-opens.  For the record, that hearing concluded last Friday, October 1.  
Chapter 1 of the book opens with a slightly earlier reference!  Ms Siggins states:  “It began some 230 million years ago, or so geologists estimate.”  One might say the rest is history but that would be too flippant in describing a story that has ripped a rural community apart.  Vested interests from trans-national companies trying to exploit the gas market to state agencies who also wish to see that happen were (and are being) aided and abetted by other state agencies from Government Departments to the Gardaí.