It’s all part of a planned exercise.

An emergency hours of darkness exercise will take place at Cork Airport tonight, Tuesday, November 28th to test the readiness of the airport and other agencies to deal with a major incident.

The exercise is required under safety regulations and will start at 7.45pm, running for approximately two hours until 9.45pm.

“There will be no impact to the flight schedule and there will be no exercise activities in the terminal building.” a spokesperson told us.

“However please note that there will be some emergency service vehicles operating in the vicinity of and at Cork Airport tonight as part of this exercise.”

The event will involve airline personnel based at Cork Airport, the Irish Aviation Authority, An Garda Síochána, Cork City Fire Brigade, The National Ambulance Service and the Health Services Executive.

The emergency exercise will evaluate the responsiveness of all agencies in case of a future emergency at Cork Airport.

“The purpose of the exercise is to test the internal emergency plan and the response of the external emergency service partners in implementing the Inter Agency Emergency Plan for Cork Airport.” explained Kevin Cullinane, daa Group Head of Communications.

“The exercise will not impact on flight operations and the public should not be alarmed if they see emergency vehicles in operation around the vicinity of Cork Airport tonight between the hours of 7.45pm and 9.45pm.”