One school has said it can longer use its yard as it wants to, because of noise from nearby Dublin Airport.

Patricia Finnegan is Vice-Principal of Kilcoskan National School, which has 117 students.

She told Lunchtime Live the planes can be constant.

"The worst-case scenario for our school would be we would have a plane flying directly over the roof of our school, or over our schoolyard, every two minutes at very low height," she said.

"[It] brings with that very loud noise, very strong smells of aviation fluid and all sorts of disruption".

Ms Finnegan said a lot of students also live at home with the same noise.

"It's the kind of school where generations of families have walked through our doors," she said.

"We have 117 students in this school, many of them that are living locally.

"So they're being bombarded by the noise at home, [and] they're coming to school to be bombarded by the noise again".

'Really feeling the impact'

Ms Finnegan said this is the first time they have been impacted by this noise.

"We have never been impacted in my 15 years previously anyway," she said.

"We're really feeling the impact of it, because we are such a small school.

"We rely heavily on our outdoor space, it serves so many purposes for us.

"It gives us the option to come together as a school, to invite the community in.

"We don't have a PE hall, so when we have to bring learning outside it's so important that it's peaceful.

"We've had a couple of assemblies... that we just had to cut short because the noise was being too loud".

'Pupils with autism'

Ms Finnegan said there are particular concerns for children who require special needs.

"We have two classes here for pupils with autism - unfortunately, those children are non-verbal, pre-verbal children," she said.

"They can't communicate with us the impact that this is having on them.

"So we have to be very proactive and pre-empt the problems this might be causing for them.

"That's meant that we can use our outdoor space a lot less frequently, for fears and for concerns that we could be triggering something for those children".

Kilcoskan National School in north Dublin. Picture by: Kilcoskan National School

Ms Finnegan said planes are coming from two directions: either over the school roof, or over the school yard.

"I think, ultimately, there's suggestions of insulation and all of that kind of stuff," she said.

"You can't insulate our yard, and our yard is something that's worked really well for us since 1948," she added.

She added that while airport operator DAA has engaged with them, "it's very PC, it's all done correctly - but we don't have anymore information than the rest of the community."

Listen back to the full interview below:

Main image: Kilcoskan National School in north Dublin. Picture by: Dublin Airport