Tragedy struck heart of Irish nation

SOLIDARITY Fiona Commins from Murneen in Claremorris, daughter of reporter Michael Commins, attended the candlelight vigil with another 1,000 students in Berkeley, California, last week. Also pictured is Cathy O'Dwyer from Dundrum, Co Dublin.



Tragedy that has struck right at the heart of the Irish nation


Michael Commins

LAST Tuesday morning, I was at home in the kitchen when the RTÉ Radio 1 news came on just after the 12 o’clock Angelus bell. A reference to California caught my attention and a follow-up mention of Berkeley drew me in.
Two weeks earlier, I had brought my daughter Fiona to Dublin Airport where, along with her friend Aisling Brennan from Letterkenny, they departed for San Francisco Airport and their summer J1 stay in the town of Berkeley in the “Bay Area”.
You say the goodbyes and hug them and hope they have a memorable three months in America, the start of their great adventure. You watch until they go out of sight, those special farewell waves grafted on your heart, and you look forward to welcoming them back in 13 weeks time.
A search of the internet some minutes after hearing the RTÉ bulletin carried news of a balcony collapse in Berkeley and some fatalities. A short time later, there was confirmation there were Irish among the dead and, a few minutes afterwards, a statement from our own Minister for Foreign Affairs, Charlie Flanagan from Laois, that a number of Irish students had died in the tragedy.
We tried to contact Fiona but no response. After all, it was only around 4.30am in the morning there. At 12.26pm (our time), I sent a Facebook message asking if she was okay.
An hour and nine minutes went by before the response came back: “I’m fine. Phone is acting up and FB keeps shutting down on me. Amanda (Bell) and GrΡinne (Halligan) are all ok too.”

All kinds of thoughts
All kinds of thoughts go through your mind in the interval between hearing the breaking news on RTÉ and confirmation that one of your own is safe and sound. You realise what fear of the unknown can do to your heart and soul, the anxiety, the doubt, the dread of just not knowing.
In that hour and half as thousands of others waited for news, I knew that, in a moment in time, we would become inextricably linked with other families where the devastating news of the loss of loved ones was about to become a reality.
Most of that sad news descended on south Dublin … and these families might as well have been up or down the road here in Mayo. In the space of 90 minutes, they had become our neighbours, linked by that special bond that unites Irish people the world over.
This is a tragedy that has struck right at the heart of the Irish nation, young people on their first great journey, radiant and beaming, lovely and beautiful and every other word that fits so easily on the canvas of life.
LorcΡn Miller, Olivia Burke, Eoghan Culligan, Eimear Walsh, Nicolai Schuster and Ashley Donohoe, died in the balcony collapse. Seven other young people from Dublin received serious injuries in the tragic accident.
You hear the names for the first time on the 10pm radio news on RTÉ and it hurts to the core. The Wednesday morning newspapers give us the first glimpse of those wonderful young people from Dublin. And the heart is overcome with emotion and the eyes cloud up with tears. And you know you would try and swim the ocean if you bring them back again.

Beaming smiles
Your eyes are drawn back time and time to those beaming smiles and you know you will carefully hold on to these newspapers and that these young students and their families will always be an extension of your own life in the times to come.
When Fiona confirmed that the place she was going to on the J1 visa was Berkeley, beside San Francisco, the only thing I said to her was keep away from high rise buildings … aware of the potential for the ‘big one’ to strike the area as the city is on the San Andreas fault line when it comes to earthquakes and tremors. But I little thought that a balcony collapse would forever bind the city of Berkeley and the hearts of the Irish people of summer 2015 in such a tragic way.

Locals in Berkeley
Berkeley is home this summer to so many young Irish people. Friends of Fiona’s from the general Claremorris area who are currently in Berkeley on the J1 include GrΡinne and Darragh Halligan, Amanda Bell (Taugheen), Margaret Hughes,  Elaine Murphy (Garrymore), Sarah Commons, Paul Kirrane (Irishtown) and Darren Connolly (Ballindine). Six of those, Amanda, Elaine, Aoife, Margaret, Sarah, and Vanessa are all staying in Library Gardens where the tragedy took place. All of them were present for the special Vigil held in Berkeley last Wednesday night.
On Saturday night, I checked the flight radar 24.com website and watched the Aer Lingus (so proud of our national airline and everything they do so well) flight to Dublin take off from San Francisco Airport. At 1.58am (our time), the plane gentle rose into the California evening, climbing over the Pacific coastline before heading north and then taking a right turn passing over the Berkeley region six minutes later at a height of 10,525 feet.
And the tears rolled down my face as I thought of the overwhelming grief and emotion of the families on board that flight, taking off from the same airport where just some weeks earlier, those young people had arrived with such hopes and dreams in the alluring and enchanting state of California.
The long flight would take them up over some of the western states of the USA, crossing the Canadian border and then out across the Atlantic, flying over the southern tip of Greenland, reaching landfall over Ireland on the northern tip of the Mayo coastline at Belderrig and Lacken and Ballycastle, as the Aer Lingus flight commenced its descent for Dublin.
Not since the terrible days of the Omagh Bomb in 1998 and the Stardust Night Club Fire in Dublin in 1981 has a tragedy hit home so powerfully with the Irish people.
In our hearts we feel a grief beyond words, a loss that will forever resonate in our hearts and minds when we hear mention of the city of Berkeley in far off California.  In south Dublin and all over the island of Ireland, our ‘sisters and brothers’ will truly stay forever young.