Tragedy of best friends from tiny Scottish isle
TWO young friends from a remote Hebridean island were among the casualties following the atrocity.
Eilidh Macleod, 14, of Barra, was still missing last night but Laura MacIntyre, 15, was found badly injured in hospital by her family yesterday afternoon.
Laura’s parents Nan and Michael had made the long trip from the island to search for their daughter.
Eilidh’s father Roddy also travelled to Manchester to join his wife Marion, who had accompanied the girls to the city. The trip to Manchester and tickets to the concert had been a birthday present for Eilidh.
Mr and Mrs MacIntyre had spent yesterday desperately searching hospitals and hotels in the city for the missing girls. Laura was last night fighting for her life in intensive care after being ‘badly burned’ in the blast. Speaking from her home in Borve, Barra, her grandmother Cecilia MacFadyen revealed the youngster had been found.
She said: ‘I’ve just heard – she’s in intensive care. Her mum and dad are going straight there but they don’t know how bad she is yet. I’m absolutely distraught.’
Barra’s tight-knit community, which has fewer than 1,100 inhabitants, was yesterday in shock at the news that the pair had been caught up in the bombing.
Angus MacNeil, SNP MP for the Western Isles and a family friend of the MacIntyres, said that Eilidh’s mother ‘got a text at the end of the concert saying it was the last song. She went to look for the girls but people were running out of the place in a panic. Since that text message ... she has heard nothing.’