Derry News wins major awards at media ‘Oscars’… read all about it!
The Derry News has won a number of awards at the ‘Oscars’ of the media industry in Northern Ireland.
The Northern Ireland Media Awards were held in the Mac Theatre in Belfast on Friday night.
The event honours the best in local journalism across newspapers, radio, television and online.
The Derry News had been shortlisted for six awards and walked away with three major accolades.
The paper won the award for ‘Front Page of the Year’ for its coverage of the Buncrana Pier tragedy earlier this year.
The front page, which was designed by JP Cunningham, carried an image of Davitt Walsh holding Rioghnach-Ann McGrotty, the little girl whose life he saved when the car in which she was travelling with five other members of her family slipped in to Lough Swilly from Buncrana Pier.
Tragically, the other members of Rioghnach-Ann’s family died.
At Friday night’s event, the Derry News also won a silver award in the category of Local Newspaper of the Year.
It was also a great night for the paper’s sports reporter Steven Doherty who received a silver award in the category of Columnist of the Year.
Steven had also been shortlisted in the Newcomer of the Year category.
Derry News editor Ciaran O’Neill said he was delighted with the paper’s success.
“We try each week to produce a good quality local paper and it is nice to get this type of recognition,” he said.
“The events at Buncrana in March were so heart-breaking and it was very difficult for everyone involved at the Derry News to report on what happened there.
“However, we hope that our front page, which showed Davitt holding Riognach-Ann for the first time after he had rescued her, highlighted something positive to emerge from such tragedy.”
The Derry News was also shortlisted at the Northern Ireland Media Awards for Supplement of the Year for a special 32-page supplement it produced on last year’s Foyle Cup football tournament.
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