Qualla: Blacksod Bay https://qualla.com/blacksod-bay en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:40:12 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/8/g/blacksod-bay-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Blacksod Bay https://qualla.com/blacksod-bay Blacksod Bay: Introduction https://qualla.com/blacksod-bay/ Photo credit Oliver Dixon, CC BY-SA 2.0. If you sailed up to the Mullet Peninsula in 1588 with the wreckage of the Spanish Armada scattering behind you, Blacksod Bay would have looked like salvation - a deep, wide anchorage tucked behind a long granite-armoured peninsula, sixteen kilometres long and eight wide, opening to the Atlantic only at its southern mouth. The Spanish did not all reach it; many died on the rocks of the surrounding coast. But the bay's reputation as a safe harbour in a brutal coastline was already established. Three and a half centuries later, that same bay - and a weather report sent from its lighthouse at dawn on 3 June 1944 - would help General Dwight D. Eisenhower decide when to launch the largest seaborne invasion in history.

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Image: Oliver Dixon | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/8/g/blacksod-bay-wp/gc8g-blacksod-bay-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Blacksod Bay: A Bay Built by Tectonics https://qualla.com/blacksod-bay/ Photo credit Nilfanion, CC BY-SA 3.0. Blacksod Bay is a geological accident worth pausing over. The Mullet Peninsula is a long arm of ancient gneiss and schist - some of the oldest rock in Ireland, formed deep in the earth's crust over a billion years ago. At its southern tip, an outcrop of high-quality granite from ...

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Image: Nilfanion | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/8/g/blacksod-bay-wp/gc8g-blacksod-bay-a-bay-built-by-tectonics.mp3 0:06 2 full Blacksod Bay: Three Lighthouses https://qualla.com/blacksod-bay/ Photo credit James Emmans, CC BY-SA 2.0. Three lighthouses watch over Blacksod Bay and its approaches. Blacksod Lighthouse - one of only two truly square lighthouses in Ireland - was completed in 1866 from granite cut at Termon Hill and occupies the bay's southern entrance. Twelve miles offshore, Blackrock Lighthouse st...

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Image: James Emmans | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/8/g/blacksod-bay-wp/gc8g-blacksod-bay-three-lighthouses.mp3 0:06 3 full Blacksod Bay: The Forecast That Delayed D-Day https://qualla.com/blacksod-bay/ Photo credit United Kingdom Hydrographic Office, Public domain. In the early hours of 3 June 1944, Maureen Flavin Sweeney - 21 years old and the postmistress at the Blacksod Lighthouse - logged a routine weather observation: falling barometer, force 6 winds rising. Her readings were telegraphed to Dublin, then to London, then to General Eisen...

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Image: United Kingdom Hydrographic Office | Public domain

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/8/g/blacksod-bay-wp/gc8g-blacksod-bay-the-forecast-that-delayed-d-day.mp3 0:06 4 full Blacksod Bay: What the Bay Holds Now https://qualla.com/blacksod-bay/ Photo credit Kiran Madhusudhanan, CC BY-SA 4.0. Today Blacksod Bay supports a quieter rhythm. Boat trips leave from Blacksod village in summer for the Inishkea Islands, the deserted whaling station of Inishglora where the Children of Lir are said to be buried, and the Duvillaun group further out. Elly Bay on the bay's western ...

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Image: Kiran Madhusudhanan | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/8/g/blacksod-bay-wp/gc8g-blacksod-bay-what-the-bay-holds-now.mp3 0:06 5 full