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This site includes the postings from the Irish Aires email list. This includes a listing of Irish/Celtic events in the Houston area and other information that the Irish Aires radio program posts.
Monday, October 03, 2005
Danny O'Flaherty- On the Road Again (but not makin' music with his friends)
http://www.irishabroad.com/news/irishinamerica/news/bar-owner-sept2805.asp
Bar Owner Evacuates Twice
By Sean O' Driscoll
A New Orleans pub owner is back on the refugee trial again
this week after Hurricane Rita wrecked his temporary home
in Texas.
Danny O'Flaherty said that he was "exhausted" and wanted to
get back to work after his family had been forced to escape
both Katrina and Rita.
Danny, who owns O'Flaherty's, New Orleans largest Irish bar
and Celtic culture center, was interviewed by the Irish
Voice last week about his last minute escape from New
Orleans before Katrina hit.
He, his wife, Susan, and their children fled to Jasper,
Texas where his brother-in-law offered them a house.
However, the town was evacuated before it was flooded by
Hurricane Rita, which smashed a tree into O'Flaherty's
temporary home.
O'Flaherty, an Irish traditional music player originally
from Connemara, Co. Galway, was coming back from a tour in
Ireland when his flight was diverted from Houston to
Dallas.
"I had to way of reaching my family. My family was
evacuated on Thursday from Jasper to the town of Texerkana,
where they met up with Susan's mother," he said.
Meanwhile, Susan's grandmother narrowly avoided being hit
by a flying tree when she fled coastal Texas with a friend
to be with her granddaughter.
O'Flaherty said he spent two nights in Dallas before he
could be reunited with his family in the town of Benton,
Texas, where they are staying at his brother-in-law's own
home.
He said that it would be two to three weeks before they
will be allowed to return to the house in Jasper.
Meanwhile, his bar in the French Quarter of New Orleans
will probably not reopen until January.
Irish folk and traditional musicians, including the
legendary Tommy Makem, are putting together a CD to help
get the pub up and running. O'Flaherty has legendary status
among musicians as a one of the best venues in the U.S. The
venue also hosts an Irish cultural center.
O'Flaherty said that he would likely separate from his
family for some weeks so that he can get back to New
Orleans and get the business restarted.
He said that East Texas had many pine forests and that his
temporary family home in Jasper was right in the eye of the
storm. "We're suffered tree damage, but we're not as badly
off as other people," he said.
"Katrina was bad for us, but this is another nightmare,
we're tired of it, I swear to God," he added.
He said that when he first heard that Rita was coming, he
felt like leaving the country.
"I remember thinking, Not another one coming. I'm going
back to Connemara!" he said.
During his visit to Ireland, O'Flaherty played a concert in
Ennis, Co. Clare on behalf of Red Cross efforts in
Louisiana.
"I'm very grateful to all those who have helped us and I
want to help others who haven't been as lucky," he said.
He added that people are out of touch with nature and no
longer able to read its signs.
"It's a real pity that has happened because I feel we are
really out of sync with nature and that could be the
problem," he said.
O'Flaherty added that there was a lot of speculation that
global warming could be responsible for the increase in
hurricanes in the gulf.
"It could be heating up the oceans and feeding the
hurricanes but opinion seems to be divided," he said.