‘Girl with a charitable, golden heart’
OLIVIA Burke was just months away from embarking on the final year of her business degree course. The 21-year- old was studying in the Institute of Art, Design and Technology (IADT) in Dun Laoghaire and was a cousin of Ashley Donohoe, the Irish-American from Santa Rosa, California, who also died in the tragedy.
Olivia had recently completed a five-month work placement at East Coast FM where she was instrumental in helping to raise €60,000 for cancer charities.
Mark Robinson, the programme director at the station, said Olivia was a “great girl” who was instantly loved by the team when she began working there in January. “She became a part of the family,” he said. “We have a reasonably small staff here...and people work shoulder to shoulder.”
He said Olivia was a driving force behind the station’s success in raising over €60,000 for cancer services in Co Wicklow during their countywide coffee morning earlier this year.
A single red rose lay on her desk there yesterday.
“She did very, very well and everybody was very impressed with her work ethic and the work that she did,” Mr Robinson said.
Olivia had been excitedly telling her colleagues about how much she was looking forward to the American trip in the weeks before she left.
“She was a lovely young woman and a good person, it’s a shame that she has been taken at this point of her life, it’s a tragedy,” he added.
IADT’s president Dr Annie Doona yesterday led the tributes to the “lovely girl” who was “doing very well on her programme”.
“She was in the Entrepreneurship and Management class. She had just completed third year and was due to complete her final year in September,” said Dr Doona.
“She was a very hard working, very creative and a lovely girl. It is very sad, it was a huge shock yesterday and we are all very deeply saddened and upset.”
There were just 38 students in Olivia’s class and she was one of just seven girls among the “close little group”.