A new row has broken out about the fate of the 1916 gun-running vessel, the Asgard, this time over the temporary parking of the boat in the open air at the Point Depot in Dublin.
The Minister for Arts, Heritage the Gaeltacht and the Islands, Ms de Valera, yesterday criticised the group given permission by the State to restore it.
Ms de Valera was clearly unhappy about its safety. She said National Museum inspectors recently inspected its temporary home. "The Asgard restoration project has been verbally advised that the current accommodation is most unsatisfactory and a formal notice to this effect is being issued to the project," the Minister said.
A spokesperson for the Department of Defence, which owns the yacht, said: "We have only become aware of this. We have been assured that the vessel is well looked after. But we accept that this is a temporary arrangement."
For decades, the Asgard languished under a corrugated iron roof in the execution yard of Kilmainham Gaol. Today, it is in The Point Depot's car-park in Dublin, covered by tarpaulin.
It was lifted by crane over the walls of the jail, where it had been held for 22 years, to appear at the planned launch of a fund at the Dublin Boat Show. However, the show was cancelled due to foot-and-mouth. The RDS housed it for a few days, but the restoration project was then left with a problem.
The project has lost some committee members over divisions about the decision to take it out of Kilmainham Gaol before funds had been raised to restore it. Its planned new home in slip two of the Alexandra Basin in Dublin Port will not be available until July at the earliest.
Concert promoter and entrepreneur Mr Harry Crosbie, who is now leading the fundraising bid, stepped in. "He graciously accommodated it. It is held behind two lines of razor wire. You would want to be pretty enthusiastic to get into it," said Mr Michael Prior, the secretary of the Asgard Restoration Project.
Last night, Mr Prior said the Point would be home for only a short while: "I just wish that people who are so concerned about it now were equally concerned over the last 22 years. Rain had lodged on its decks and bilges. Its hull had hogged. It nearly broke with the weight. It was not protected from the elements. Today, 90 per cent of it is covered by tarpaulin," said Mr Prior.
Refusing to accept fears about the security of the yacht, he said it was monitored 24 hours a day under spotlights by a security firm and closed-circuit television and checked regularly by Store Street gardai.
