NEED TO CATCH up? The Journal brings you a round-up of today’s news.

IRELAND

The parents of Irish Olympic boxer Kellie Harrington with neighbours and supporters in Portland Row, Dublin, as their daughter had the honour of leading out the Irish Team at the opening of Olympic Games in Tokyo. Leah Farrell Leah Farrell

• A man in his 60s drowned at Dollymount Strand this afternoon. A total of six people drowned in Ireland this week.
• 1,386 new cases of Covid-19 were announced in Ireland. 106 people are in hospital with the illness, including 22 people in ICU.
• Health officials advised that people should only travel abroad if they are fully vaccinated as cases related to travel are on the rise.
• A judge in Belfast ruled that there was a ‘real prospect’ that the 1998 Omagh bombing could have been prevented.
• The funeral of Des O’Malley heard that the founder of the Progressive Democrats was a “person of courage and integrity”.
• The government launched a wesite where people can request a Covid recovery cert – complete with an incorrectly spelled URL.
• A Status Orange thunderstorm and rain warning was issued for three counties this evening and a Status Yellow warning for the entire country.
• Hospitality business owners said they have experienced false bookings, abuse of staff over the phone and social media abuse by people opposed to the Digital Covid Certificate. 
• Irish Water will be sentenced in September over breaches of environmental regulations in Co Cork and Co Kildare.

INTERNATIONAL

The Olympic flame was lit by the Japanese tennis player Naomi Osaka. DPA / PA Images DPA / PA Images / PA Images

#VACCINES: The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has recommended authorising Moderna’s Covid-19 vaccine for children ages 12 to 17, the first time the shot has been authorised for people under 18.

#INDIA: At least 32 people have been killed after landslides triggered by heavy monsoon rains hit parts of western India.

#OLYMPICS: The opening ceremony of the Tokyo Olympics took place today in a nearly empty stadium after a year-long pandemic postponement and a build-up marred by scandal and controversy.

PARTING SHOT

So, @osslate and I spotted a bit of Irish government incompetence and decided to have some fun, primarily because we were also worried some scammers might actually grab the URL and do harm with it lolhttps://t.co/YGRsuG756b pic.twitter.com/WPPz5cYNC5

— Adam Conway (@AdamConwayIE) July 23, 2021

Click here if you can’t see the tweet.

As mentioned above, the government launched a new website today to allow people to request a certificate to show they had Covid-19 in the last six months.

Unfortunately the URL for the website contains a spelling error, they forgot the second ‘i’ in certificate.

Journalist Adam Conway spotted the error earlier today and purchased the correctly spelled domain name to prevent it from “falling into the wrong hands”.

He and his friend Fionn Kelleher worked to register the correctly spelled website and “got to work filling it out with what’s on the site now”. 

Irishcovidcertificateportal.org shows a delightfully shoddy drawing of a harp and a link back to the actual government website.

Conway has not yet been contacted by any government or Department of Health officials in relation to the URL.

“I’m happy to give it back,” he told The Journal.

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