Lucky couple pick up €4.4m from Lotto HQ
National Lottery A YOUNG married couple collected their €4.4million winnings from Lotto HQ yesterday.
The pair bought the lucky ticket at Ryan’s Daybreak in Milltown, Co Galway.
The family were travelling through Galway when they decided to do the draw on a whim.
They said: “Anytime we are away from home we play the Lotto when we are passing through a random town.
“Nothing prepares you for the shock when you actually check your ticket to find out that you’ve won. It still hasn’t sunk in.”
The husband and wife plan to use some of the money to help those closest to them and will donate a sum to charity. A MAN working on his uncle’s fishing boat died after the vessel capsized just 100m from shore, it was revealed yesterday.
Dublin Coroner’s Court heard Jamie Mcallister and Keith Mcallister made a desperate bid to swim to safety.
It also emerged there were two life jackets on board the trawler, but neither of the men was wearing one.
Skipper Keith survived and told the inquest into his nephew’s death how his 8.6m dredging fishing vessel the “Shanie Boy” flipped over leaving them submerged.
The incident happened at Skerries harbour, Co Dublin, on May 26 last year.
Jamie, 28, who was employed as an apprentice electrician, had asked his uncle for a few days’ work.
The weather was sunny, the sea was calm and the tide was coming in as the pair left the harbour at 9.30am. Keith said they were dredging and emptying the contents into barrels on deck when the boat began to slow at around 12.45pm.
They lifted the dredger and found it was carrying a lot of weight in the form of stones.
As it came up out of the water the dredger swung to the starboard side.
The weight shifted the vessel in the water and Keith ran to the wheel house to try to turn the vessel but it “flipped over” in a matter of seconds.
He said: “I ran in to spin the wheel the opposite way and drive her on.
“The TV flew off the wall and hit me in the face, I think it knocked me out. I came to up to my neck in water. The [wheel house] door was closed and everything was jammed up against it.
“I went down three times to clear the way to get out the door.”
Keith added when he surfaced he saw Jamie clinging to the hull and the pair decided to swim to the nearest yacht as the boat quickly began to sink.
He said: “We tried to swim but every time I looked up we were further away from the yacht. “When the boat went down the bubbles separated us and that was the last time I saw Jamie.”
Keith tried to keep swimming but told how the tide was against him. Keith grew exhausted and lost consciousness in the water. Keith Mcallister yesterday Skerries-based fireman Michael Woods witnessed the incident from the shore.
He told the court: “About 1.20pm I saw a single boat roll and two heads coming up. They got away from the boat but the stern went down and one disappeared.”
He notified emergency services and Skerries RNLI launched immediately and rescued Keith from the water.
The following morning Garda divers located Jamie’s body in nine metres of water, 60m from the site of the sinking.
A postmortem gave the cause of death as drowning.
Health and Safety Inspector Anthony Morahan noted in his report neither man was wearing a life jacket, though two were available on board.
Coroner Dr Myra Cullinane returned a verdict of misadventure and noted the “relevant factor” that flotation devices were not worn.