Clifden: Marconi, Alcock and Brown, and the Sky Road

Clifden was the idea of John D'Arcy, who first proposed a town on this coast in 1812 and built Clifden Castle, now a ruin, to the west. Four miles south, Marconi built his first high-power transatlantic wireless station, and on 17 October 1907 it opened the first fixed wireless service between Europe and North America; Jack Phillips, later the Titanic's chief radio operator, worked there. On 15 June 1919 Alcock and Brown ended the first non-stop transatlantic flight by landing their Vickers Vimy in Derrygimlagh bog beside it, mistaking the green bog for a meadow. West of town runs the Sky Road, and north at Claddaghduff you can drive or walk across the sand to Omey Island at low tide.