GNR personnel spent a busy Easter patrolling the nation’s highways and keeping sober drivers safe from the idiocy of others who still think it sensible to drive while talking on a mobile phone or when drunk, or both.
Between April 13th and 16th, GNR road patrols and wayside inspections on the country’s busiest highways has shown the motoring public to be as best, forgetful and at worst, deliberately risking their own lives and the lives of others.
Having taking off from Cascais aerodrome, a Swiss registered twin-engine aeroplane exploded and crashed into the carpark of a branch of Lid shortly after 11:00 on Easter Monday.
The four people onboard, three French and one Swiss, were killed as was the driver of an Algarve-based lorry which was hit in the supermarket loading area.
This slide below shows the ranking of the Algarve’s main tourism markets last year. The UK is still far in the lead with solid growth of 8.6% and Germany still in second place. The biggest growth of all the main markets is from France.
It may seem like an overstatement but the numbers don’t lie. Tourism is at an all-time high in the Algarve. Hotel bookings and revenue continue to break records year after year, there are more flights at Faro Airport than ever before and the sector is in an “excellent position” to keep growing in 2017. With another extremely busy Easter around the corner, the Resident met with the Algarve’s tourism boss Desidério Silva to discuss his plans to keep this trend going.
Lisbon’s hotly-contested “best pastel de nata” award has been settled for this year and sees 25-year-old pastry chef Francisco Duarte walking off with all the glory.
Whipping up the traditional ‘egg custard tarts’ for pastelaria O Pãozinho das Marias, he beat off stiff competition and ensured that his bosses’ business in the seaside town of Ericeira is now brisker than ever. Even better, the prized “pasteis” cost just €1 each.
Photo: Facebook
A specially-targeted five-day strike by airport security staff begins tomorrow at Portugal’s national airports, threatening passenger delays throughout the Easter period.
ANA airports authority recommends that people travelling between April 13 and 17 “check instructions transmitted by their airlines” and act accordingly.
New data from Schengen space security (SIS) reveals that just this year 537 people have been barred from entering Portugal - the majority (443) of them from what Diário de Notícias describes as “third world countries” with criminal records and alerts in place over having already been expelled from Schengen states. The remaining 94 were people already wanted on European arrest warrants. Says DN, these were arrested and extradited.
As for the wider implications of SIS data, DN claims that there are 830,000 people within the free circulation space who for one reason or another are “sought by the authorities”.
Journalists complain it’s hard work following Portugal’s energetic president Marcelo. This week has been no exception. From a visit to former colony Cape Verde, he has jetted off to Senegal - to be the first Portuguese head of state to visit the country, linked to Portugal through the Discoveries, since the April 25 revolution.
A highlight of the trip will be the delivery of 162 ambulances equipped by a Portuguese firm.
Doctors syndicates have called a two-day national strike for May 10-11.
The reasons given are “lack of agreement with the health ministry after a year of negotiations, and its failure to comply with established promises - namely to pay overtime and open placement programmes”:
