There was a real-life scare for the cast and crew of popular TV series Game of Thrones as rocks fell from a quarry near their set in Northern Ireland.
Many of the scenes for the award winning HBO show are filmed in Co Antrim. Filming for the much anticipated sixth season has been completed.
One of the numerous filming locations in Northern Ireland is Magheramorne Quarry, Co Antrim. While the cast and crew were busy on the Castle Black set, the weather took a turn for the worse and the area was struck with torrential rain.
The rain disrupted the ‘seismic profile’ of the quarry and caused some of the rocks to start to fall and the crew decided it was time to leave.
Producer Dan Weiss told Entertainment Weekly: “Once people saw the small pebbles start to come down that turned into slightly larger pebbles, everybody made the group decision to immediately step away from the set.”
Thankfully nobody was injured in the rockslide. However, it caused big problems with regards to the filming schedule and they had to re-arrange filming for much of the season.
Weiss continued: “Bernie [Caufield] and Chris [Newman, producers] already have hardest scheduling job in the film and TV industry. And they had this thrown into the works too, which caused them to drastically reschedule the whole season on the fly.
“But they did it, and we got everything we needed in that quarry after it was seismically shored up and netted and proper protection measures were taken.
“It actually worked out for the best — some of the stuff we were shooting in that location benefited from the additional prep time the rockslide gave us.”
Owen Teale, who plays Ser Alliser Thorne said: “A piece of rock the size of a London townhouse just fell.”
Many of the iconic settings in Game of Thrones are filmed in Northern Ireland including Winterfell, The King’s Road, Riverrun, Pyke, the Iron Islands and the Haunted Forest.
Many of the show’s stars have previously paid tribute to Northern Ireland and commented on the beauty of the numerous filming locations.
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