TRAGIC PILOT MARK COMES HOME
Body of Rescue 116 victim recovered as search for pair continues
SEARCH and rescue teams formed a guard of honour as the second copter tragedy victim was brought home yesterday.
Pilot Mark Duffy’s remains were recovered 12 days after the crash off the coast of Co Mayo. The Coast Guard’s Michael O’toole said: “Our hearts are with the family today.” Divers are still trying to find Ciaran Smith and Paul Ormsby.
It’s a step forward but there’s still 2 crewmen we need to bring home SUPT TONY HEALY BELMULLET YESTERDAY
THE body of Captain Mark Duffy was finally recovered from the wreckage of Rescue 116 yesterday amid heartbreaking scenes.
The remains of the experienced Coast Guard pilot were brought to the pier in Blacksod, Co Mayo, by Naval Service officers, including Lieutenant Commander Darragh Kirwan and Lieutenant Dan Humphries. Capt Duffy’s coffin, draped in a Tricolour, was placed in a hearse led by a lone-piper. Coast Guard colleagues and emergency services personnel formed a guard of honour as he became the second of the four-strong crew to be recovered after the crash 12 days ago. The search continues for his winchmen colleagues and friends Paul Orsmby and Ciaran Smith, who remain missing in the Atlantic. Captain Dara Fitzpatrick was recovered from the sea but was later pronounced dead in hospital. Michael O’toole, the Irish Coast Guard’s on scene coordinator, said: “It’s a very poignant day, very sad and very poignant. We have recovered one of our colleagues. “Our hearts and our thoughts are specifically with the family today.” After a robot submersible worked through the night to cut away some of the cockpit, Naval Service divers were sent down in relays, with eight minutes at a time on the seabed, to free the pilot’s remains. A small white tent was erected at Blacksod Pier, some 12km from the submerged wreckage of Rescue 116, where a formal identification of the body took place. It was then taken to Mayo University Hospital for a postmortem. Capt Duffy, who was in his late 40s, lived in Dundalk, Co Louth, with his wife Hermione and children Esme and Fionn. He joined the Coast Guard in 2001 and trained in the US, where he worked for the Californian Coast Guard for a number of years. The popular and respected Louth man once memorably landed a helicopter in the playing field at his son Fionn’s school to give a talk to transition year students. Garda Supt Tony Healy of Belmullet Garda Station said yesterday: “The body has been positively identified as Captain Mark Duffy. There was a good representation of his relatives there. “It’s a big step forward today again to recover one of the bodies. But there’s still two crewmen out there that we need to bring home.” Lt Cmdr Kirwan said: “It’s not lost on us that the families are all here as well. “At the end of the day it is about the families. “It would be on our minds, first of all for the divers to be successful this morning and to bring back the body of one of the crew members and obviously to give some respect and dignity on the journey back in and to be able to effectively offer ceremony to the recovery of that body when we brought it back ashore.” Capt Duffy had been missing since the Sikorsky S92 helicopter crashed on its way to refuel at Blacksod lighthouse on March 13 as it prepared to assist in a medical evacuation mission. After hearing about the recovery of the remains yesterday, Mark Dearey, the chair of Dundalk Municipal District, paid tribute and offered his condolences to the Duffy family. He said: “[Mark] was hugely respected and admired. I’d like to take this opportunity to convey our deepest sympathies on behalf of the entire community of North Louth. “We know it’s been a time of really intense suffering and we just hope now that the opportunity to mourn with the remains of Mark will provide some relief for Hermione and her children. “Our thoughts and our prayers are with them completely and will be for a long, long time to come. The family and the community, particularly around the local area, have been extraordinary. “A candlelight vigil was held in the local area on St Patrick’s night and that was really an expression of support and solidarity and I thought it was a wonderful occasion. And I hope as time passes that it will be a memory that Hermione can