Claire Byrne has opened up about how the death of Six One News co-anchor Keelin Shanley has impacted her and all of the staff at RTÉ.
Keelin passed away last month aged just 51 after battling with cancer.
Claire expressed that it “hasn’t been an easy time” in the weeks following her death.
“It was particularly difficult on the day of the election results, Claire told Dublin Live.
“Everybody came in and all of our colleagues in the make-up room and everyone on cameras, everybody was affected.”
“So it is very recent and people are still grieving at RTÉ. We were only talking about her at an International Women’s Day event we had internally on Wednesday.”
We on the Claire Byrne Live team have been greatly saddened by the news of Keelin Shanley’s death yesterday. Keelin was a wonderfully supportive colleague and friend – and a brilliant journalist. Her intelligence and warmth will be missed so much by all of us… (1/2) pic.twitter.com/xYyMr7L3qp
— Claire Byrne Live (@ClaireByrneLive) February 9, 2020
“And it is just really difficult and you think about her husband and her dad and her family and her children, and yes it hasn’t been an easy time.”
Touching on the deaths of Gay Byrne, Marian Finucane and  Larry Gogan, Claire said:
“It was really difficult and there is no point in pretending otherwise. It was really, really difficult.”
“It’s been a really difficult time in RTE because we have had four deaths in very quick succession and Keelin’s death only happened on February 8.”
