This article is from page 11 of the 2011-12-13 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 11 JPG
AN off-duty garda fell to his death while fishing with his six-year-old son in Kilkee, an inquest into his death has heard.
Adrian Martin (46), from Carrickmacross, Monaghan, was fishing at Dunlicky, Kilkee, on August 25 last, when he fell “head first” over the cliffs. He was on holidays in Kilkee with his wife Helen and their young son Dermot at the time.
Ennis Coroner’s Court heard last week that Mr Martin went fishing with his son that morning, while his wife remained at their holiday home.
A witness at the inquest, Susan Kiely, recalled going fishing with her husband and three children shortly after 11 o’clock that morning. She said that after 12 noon a man – wearing a red jacket – and little boy arrived.
Shortly after there was a “torrential downpour”. The rain was so heavy that she went to her car for shelter with her children.
After the shower had passed, she said that she returned to where she had been. She saw the man and boy standing on a smooth area of rock, fishing. She said that the rock surface where she was standing was slippy after the rain.
She said she saw the man in the red jacket standing at the cliff edge. He was bent over. She then saw him falling “head first over the cliffs”. She said she did not know if he had slipped.
“I roared to my husband ‘he is going, he is going’,” she recalled. She said she then saw the young boy starting to move forwards to the cliff face. Her husband ran over to him and took him to safety.
Helen Martin recalled going on holidays with her husband Adrian and son Dermot.
She said they had gone fishing at around 11.20am and she expected them to return to their holiday home at 1.30pm. However, they had not returned by 2.05pm. She could not make contact with him by mobile phone.
She said that a short time later, she saw her son standing beside a garda patrol car which had stopped near their holiday home.
She said that a garda told her that there had been an accident and that her husband was dead. At 3.25pm she identified her husband’s body to a garda.
Garda Eoin Daly told the inquest that Kilkee Rescue Service recovered Mr Martin’s body from the water shortly after he fell off the cliff edge.
He said that according to witnesses, Mr Martin had slipped off and from his gardaí concluded that there were no suspicious circumstances and that it was a “tragic accident”.
A post mortem examination carried out on Mr Martin’s body revealed that he had sustained a deep laceration to the left side of the forehead, an abrasion to the left side of the nose, and fractures to the left elbow, right hip and right knee.
Death was due to acute cardio respiratory failure secondary to multiple traumatic injuries including skull fractures sustained in an accidental fall.
Coroner Isobel O’Dea returned a verdict of accidental death.