Coro St fan dies during cliffhanger episode

Grandfather who suffered heart attack while watching traumatic soap-opera crash remembered as ‘charismatic and playful’ after, writes Bevan Hurley.

A grandfather who suffered a fatal heart attack while watching a ‘‘traumatic’’ episode of Coronation St has been remembered as a loving family man.

Trevor Murfitt, 81, went into cardiac arrest at his Orewa home last week while watching an episode of his favourite TV show, in which the lives of several of the main characters hung in the balance after their mini-bus crashed perilously close to a cliff overhanging a quarry.

Trevor’s wife of 41 years Barbara told how the episode had been ‘‘traumatic’’ for the two of them as they’d been avid fans of the show for more than a decade.

‘‘Trevor’s last words were ‘that bus is going to go over the edge’,’’ she said. ‘‘We were all watching the screen and half a minute later I turned to look at Trevor and he’d collapsed in his favourite chair. We rang the ambulance straight way.’’

Murfitt, who had suffered from numerous health complaints, passed away the next day in North Shore Hospital surrounded by his family.

Barbara said after 41 years of marriage and companionship, it was hard to believe her ‘‘best friend’’ was gone.

‘‘I just feel now that he’s in hospital and I’m going to go and pick him up. ‘‘He’s at peace now.’’ She said Murfitt was an avid All Blacks fan who would watch test matches four times over, and believed he would have been sitting on the team’s shoulders as they played Australia at Eden Park last night.

Trevor was one of four singers in The Highlights who sang the opening title tune to 1960s TV talent show Have A Shot.

And he even managed to sing at his own funeral at St John’s Catholic Church in Orewa after the family played his recordings of Ave Maria during the service, and I Will Always Walk Beside You as his coffin was carried out.

His grandson, Jonathan Marshall, delivered a moving eulogy, saying how devastated he was that his ‘‘Poppa’’ would not be around to see the birth of his first child in March.

‘‘Just last week I was able to call Nana and tell her the news we are having a girl,’’ Marshall said.

‘ Trevor’s last words were ‘that bus is going to go over the edge’. We were all watching the screen and half a minute later I turned to look at Trevor and he’d collapsed in his favourite chair.’ BARBARA MURFITT, PICTURED ABOVE WITH TREVOR

He said his grandfather had a ‘‘charismatic and playful nature that has touched me, and indeed so many others, so many times’’.

‘‘The man, who ever since I was born, has loved me like a son and a best friend. It’s the type of relationship that is both rare and irreplaceable.’’

The Coronation St episode, which screened in the United Kingdom in January 2015, but only reached New Zealand screens on October 14, caused a stir for the hard-hitting storyline which left one of the show’s favourite characters, Carla Connor, fighting for survival following the minivan crash.

A TVNZ spokeswoman expressed their sympathy for the family. She said they were not aware of any complaints about the episode.

Coronation St actor Katie McGlynn, who plays Sinead Tinker, described filming the crash scenes as ‘‘huge’’ and ‘‘scary’’.

‘‘It does look really petrifying,’’ she said. ‘‘It was a huge stunt and it took a big team to pull it all together but I think we’ve done it justice.’’

More than 8.8 million Corrie fans tuned in to watch the crash episode when it originally aired in the UK and #corriecrash started trending as soon as the Italian Job- style cliffhanger ended.