Wide Atlantic Weird: The Legend Of The Inisfola Broadcast

Wide Atlantic Weird is an on-going collection of stories that attempt to create that feeling you get when you come across a delicious little fragment of weirdness, a story that's so out-there it can't possibly be true, yet one which you can't dismiss out of hand. When you stumble across such a tale buried in a chapter of an old collection of 'unexplained' stories, or when you hear an unbelievable story from a listener to a podcast, that's Wide Atlantic Weird.

Source: Strange World, B.W. Bourke, 1995

Though Ireland was neutral during World War 2, the Irish government maintained a radio outpost off the coast of Kerry in order to monitor both Allied and Axis military radio chatter. The location of this facility was Inisfola Island, about fifty miles off the Deargalagh peninsula. A radio tower was built, as well as several maintenance and residential buildings, and the facility was staffed by Irish Army officers who were formerly stationed at the Curragh, where both British and German POWs were held, so they themselves were fluent in German. During their three years of operation, they recorded no definite evidence of military activities that threatened to breach Irish neutrality. However, in January 1945, they received a transmission that remains unexplained to this day.

Wide Atlantic Weird: A Phone RInging In A Deserted Hotel

Wide Atlantic Weird is an on-going collection of stories that attempt to create that feeling you get when you come across a delicious little fragment of weirdness, a story that's so out-there it can't possibly be true, yet one which you can't dismiss out of hand. When you stumble across such a tale buried in a chapter of an old collection of 'unexplained' stories, or when a friend reluctantly tells you an impossible story in the small hours after a night of playing Resident Evil, that's Wide Atlantic Weird.


Source: An email from a friend I will refer to as ‘Chris Redfield.’

Hi Cian,

We’ve been talking a lot recently about the subject of the supernatural, and I know you’re looking for some stories to read on your show. Well, I’ve got at least one story I can share with you that I think would be suitable. I haven’t told it to you before because it’s from a somewhat dark time in my life, and it brings up some bad memories. I don’t know for sure that this is because of the unexplained event that happened to me, but this strange happening and my dark mental state at the time are inextricably linked for me.

Irish Horror: The Lodgers (2017)

The Lodgers is a 2017 Irish film directed by Brian O'Malley, stars Charlotte Vega, Bill Milner and Eugene Simon, and was filmed almost entirely at the infamous Loftus Hall in County Wexford, a real-life source of many urban legends and the location of much legend-tripping.

I first heard stories about Loftus Hall while I was was in college. Many of my colleagues from the southeast side of the country knew of this place. Today it has been reinvented as a tourist attraction (dark tourism, I guess) but back then it was dilapidated, rotting, and hella spooky. Pretty much everyone who spoke to me of the place had visited with their friends upon a dark night on a 'dare.' There are myriad local legends about the place, some of them unique to Loftus Hall, others seeming to be the kind of generic myths that get attached to any spooky old building. In particular, it was most often said that a gentleman visiting the Hall centuries ago was revealed to have been the Devil himself (he revealed a cloven hoof when a lady bent over to pick up a dropped playing card), upon which he disappeared through the roof in a pillar of fire. The patch where he burst through the roof was said to be still visible. Suffice it to say that Loftus Hall is a unique location in which to set a period ghost story movie, and I heartily approve. 

Irish Horror: Wake Wood (2011)

I took the time last week to watch a couple of recent (ish) Irish horror movies, and while I probably won't have time to record my thoughts on them for the podcast, I'm instead going to scribble a few ideas here. I figured that I'd be covering more Irish horror on the 'cast, especially as there are now more and more entries in this once thinly-populated category, but between one thing and another, I haven't got around to covering many yet. Anyway, here's my two cents on 2011's Wake Wood. There'll be no spoilers, and these are not really reviews as such, more a collection of analytical notes, if I may use so grandiose a term.

Off The Wagon: The New Barbarians

During the 80s, the Italian movie industry went crazy imitating certain big-budget movies. Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior somehow earned more Italian rip-offs than most, so to learn more about this bizarre fixation, Cian and Ali decided to check out 1983's The New Barbarians. If you dream of a post-apocalyptic future in which bands of 'Templars' in tight white uniforms drive around quarries wielding awkward weapons from tinfoil vehicles, then this might be the film for you!

Listen to the podcast here.

Off The Wagon: Star Trek V: The Final Frontier

In the late 80s, legendary egotist William 'Captain Kirk' Shatner finally got his chance to direct a Star Trek movie, to the horror of the rest of the Trek cast. For years he had tyrannised them on the sets of the original TV show, and had barely held back his frustration that fellow cast member Leonard Nimoy was getting to direct the Trek movies that followed! Now was his chance to show them all what he could do - and he had a typically bold and ambitious story to tell, too. The result was one of the most hated of all the original crews' cinematic adventures. Join Cian, who still has some love for this mess of a movie, and Donal, who really doesn't, as they find out exactly what went wrong during the making of Star Trek V: The Final Frontier.

Listen to the podcast here.

Off The Wagon: UFO Special

Why do we think of flying saucers and little grey men when we think of aliens?

Inspired by too many late nights skywatching (and X-Files watching), special agents Cian and Chris get spooky once again as they tackle the topic of Unidentified Flying Objects. And as the age of fake news and conspiracy thinking is upon us, it's more important than ever to know why people continue to believe weird things!

Chris has been doing some field research and brings several sightings from the Cork area to our attention. Then Cian brings us down the rabbithole to discover the details of the very first true 'flying saucer' sighting as well as the first 'alien abduction' report to find out what we can learn from studying these cases. In between, we learn that the Victorian age had its own UFO-style 'phantom airship' hysteria. We round things off with a discussion about looking for alien civilisations and Dyson spheres.

Listen to the podcast here.