Getting into situations over his head rarely fazed Sir Roger Casement, so a new Dublin Bay seafront home should present no difficulties for the statue of the Sandycove man at the refurbished Dun Laoghaire Baths site.
Saturday's north-easterly gale flooded the town's East pier and also the nearby Dart railway line between Dun Laoghaire and Booterstown as big seas rolled into the bay.
If anyone was in any doubt what the new baths was going to have to withstand, Saturday's wintry waves illustrated the point perfectly.
The plan is for the late Knight of the British Empire, hanged for his role in the 1916 Easter Rising, to be commemorated on a plinth at the end of a short new pier being built as part of the baths refurbishment project.
The new Roger Casement statue destined for a plinth (see below) at the end of the swim jetty at Dun Laoghaire Baths
It appears, as in life, Sir Roger (who was stripped of his title before execution) will have a lot to stand up to as the plinth itself became completely covered by waves on Saturday, January 30 as the photo sequence shows below.
The new plinth for the Sir Roger Casement statue at Dun Laoghaire and the big Dublin Bay waves (below) crashing over it on Saturday Photos: Afloat
The council say the Casement figure by artist Mark Richards is cast in bronze, which will 'mature and reflect the climatic conditions of the site as the year's pass'.
As regular Afloat readers will know, the statue is to be erected along the pierhead walkway connecting the parkland areas at Newtownsmith with the beach area at Queen’s Road.
The redevelopment of Dún Laoghaire’s baths, which have been closed since 1997, is nearing completion even though construction has stopped during the COVID-19 emergency.
The €2.75 million makeovers will see the derelict pool being replaced by artists’ studios and a gallery café as well as a pier to swim from and a landing jetty for small boats and kayaks.
Casement was born to an Anglo-Irish family in nearby Sandycove in 1864 and served as a British diplomat before helping to form the Irish Volunteers.
