FAREWELL DARA ..OUR HERO
Funeral tributes to rescue pilot’s bravery and kindness
HERO pilot Dara Fitzpatrick was “kind to the core and a champion of the underdog”, mourners at her funeral heard yesterday.
The mother-of-one was one of the four crew members of Rescue 116, the Coast Guard helicopter which crashed off the coast of Mayo on Tuesday.
Captain Fitzpatrick, 45, was remembered as a “wonderful young woman and mother” who adored her young son Fionn.
Fr Andrew O’sullivan said: “She was fiercely loyal and her family was of paramount importance to her.”
MOURNERS at the funeral of Coast Guard Captain Dara Fitzpatrick heard how fitting it was that the last aircraft she flew was called Queen of the Sky.
Hundreds braved the rain to pay their final respects to the mum of one at St Patrick’s Church in Glencullen, Co Dublin, yesterday.
Uniformed Coast Guard officers, Naval Service and Air Corp staff, RNLI volunteers and other rescue workers from throughout the country travelled to bid their colleague a final farewell.
As well as President Michael D Higgins, Enda Kenny was present to pay his respects. Transport Minister Shane Ross and Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin were also in attendance.
Dara, 45, was among the four crew members of a Sikorsky S92 that disappeared without warning off the coast of Co Mayo on Tuesday.
As her body was taken from the church, Irish Coast Guard Helicopter 117 performed a flyover to honour their fallen colleagues.
Dara’s sister Niamh, who met her husband through her sibling, spoke bravely about her sister’s life and praised her family’s response to the terrible tragedy.
Niamh said: “My parents, John and Mary, you share Dara’s bravery. You have handled this with strength and dignity... You did not lock yourself away, you looked people in the face and let them comfort you.
“Our sister Emer did one of the toughest things anyone could ever do. She sat Fionn on Dara’s bed this morning and told him that his mother wasn’t coming home.”
She said Dara was soft and kind and excellent at her job. A “messer”, she was shy and had a goofy sense of humour.
Niamh added: “She was generous. She shared Fionn with us, he’s the only grandchild. We have memories of him with her that are incredible.”
The outpouring for support “feels like the country and the world are giving us a hug” and Niamh
promised the family will respond to every message, saying: “There is a card addressed to ‘Captain Dara Fitzparick’s dad, any Garda station, Mayo’ with no stamp. We got it.
“Somebody came to my dad yesterday at the house and said, ‘She saved the life of my child.’
“Somebody emailed me to my website and said, ‘Dara adopting Fionn after 40 allowed me to have hope that I could be a mother too after cancer treatment left me unable to have my own children’.”
She thanked the “beautiful girl called Eva, who we will meet, who waded into the water in Mayo when she saw Dara’s helmet, because she wanted to get it for Fionn”.
She also spoke of her initial rage at God for taking her beloved sister but has now let go of that anger.
Niamh said: “The Tuesday before we knew Dara’s body was the one recovered, I went up to her room.
“Her bed was thrown open, it was obvious she was in bed when she got the call to go out. When I put back the cover
to leave the bed flat, there was a book that she was reading and the book was called No Time To Say Goodbye.”
Niamh said her family’s hearts were united in grief with the loved ones of missing crew, colleagues Captain Mark Duffy, winchman Ciaran Smith and winch operator Paul Ormsby.
She added: “If they were here, they would be the men to carry Dara into the church. God owes us and as a family we’re calling it in now. We’re asking – bring them home, just please bring them home.” She thanked the close-knit emergency services community, including the crew of the RNLI which took Dara’s body from the water. She also paid tribute to her sister’s colleagues on rescue helicopter 115.
She said: “They couldn’t take her out of the water themselves. They went back to the boat and they took her off that boat.
“They took her in the helicopter and took her to Castlebar. They carried her in [to the hospital] themselves and we will always be grateful.”
Dara’s colleague and friend Cathal Oakes described her as a “consumate professional” and
“it was the greatest honour of my flying career to be given the opportunity to speak here today”.
He said: “It is most apt that the last ever aircraft Dara would fly was called, banríon na spéir, Queen of the Sky.”
He added Dara was involved in 800 search and rescue operations and had a distinguished career and had numerous commendations.
Paraphrasing from the famous WH Auden poem, Stop All The Clocks, Cathal said: “We have new guardian angels, we needn’t be afraid to fly.” Celebrating the funeral Mass, Fr Andrew
O’sullivan told the packed church that few funerals were “as profoundly sad and sorrowful” as Dara’s. He added: “We have lost a talented young woman who, along with her colleagues, lived good and generous lives and did so much in helping others in their time of need.
“How these extraordinary people put their own lives at risk in order to save others – what bravery. And they truly are heroes.
Fr O’sullivan said everyone was praying the “nightmare of waiting may soon be over” for the families of the missing crew members.
He added: “Dara was kind to her core and a champion of the underdog. The day she formally adopted Fionn was one of the happiest days of her life and that of her family.
“Fionn now embodies Dara’s characteristics of family - he loves to and often instigates the family group hug. Dara adored Fionn.”
Yesterday before the Ireland-england rugby match, an image of the four was projected on to the big screen during a minute’s silence.
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If they were here, they would be the men to carry Dara into Church. God bring them home
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