[5] Eric Waugh in The Independent, referring to Flackes' reporting of The Troubles, said "When it began to come to the boil - in 1966 - Flackes at once displayed before the network audience a notable talent for the simple exposition, balanced yet necessarily brief, of what was a highly complex community problem.
"[5] Flackes was born in 1921 in Burt, where he was raised, a village and district in the south of Inishowen in the north of County Donegal in the north-west of Ulster, the northern province in Ireland.
Before his career in journalism, Billy Flackes worked in the timber business in Belfast and as a telephone installer in Derry.
His East Donegal speaking style, characterised by the "staccato articulation" and clipped vowels common in Ulster, informed the audience as the Northern Irish crisis evolved over the next 16 years.
[5] Following his retirement from BBC Northern Ireland in 1982, he was nominated to the board of the Irish national broadcaster, RTÉ, in Dublin, serving until 1991.