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The inquests into the deaths of the 48 young people who died in the Stardust fire in Artane, Dublin, in 1981 feature pen portraits of each of the deceased by bereaved family members. Find all of the portraits and more coverage here.
To the world she was a name read aloud on the news. But we lost everything that night.
Teresa loved life and tried to live and enjoy every moment. It was that love for life and living that brought her to the Stardust. Teresa was a fun loving, friendly, beautiful, young girl.
Teresa attended St Mary’s Secondary school in Killester, which she hated with a passion. Although she was very bright, she had no time for academics. School was about the social aspect for her. Teresa loved hair, makeup and beauty, and she spoke about getting a career as a beautician or hairdresser.
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The night she never came home, I remember the guards coming to the house and asking: “Do these things belong to your daughter?” My ma was screaming through the house . . . The howling screams of my ma ripped through my whole body and spirit, sending me into an absence of being that I don’t think I ever came out of.
Nothing was done to help us move on, and we had nobody to talk to about the aching pain in our hearts. We had to force a false bravado to help our mother and stop her from crying.
As years passed our father was wrecked with cancer – not from life habits but from seeing his daughter lying on a slab and identified by her eternity ring, a miraculous medal and brown scapulars.
We as a family drifted away from each other. The soul had been ripped out of existence, not faded away. Our sister’s death threw a sickness over our family. Words cannot describe the sorrow our family has endured.
Our home that was once a place of laughter and music . . . was now a place of sorrow. Objects and photos were filled with painful memories. An absence filled our home and our hearts.
Lorraine: I have struggled with the great loss of my sister Teresa all my life. We shared a bedroom and on long, sleepless, nights, we would share all our troubles, dreams, and the plans we had for our future.
That night, I was out with my friends and Teresa was out with hers. Teresa had come over a number of times to chat. She was sitting near the main door, as I was, at the back.
Teresa forgot about her own safety and sought me out to tell me that there was a fire and that I was to get out. [Her] last words haunted me for the rest of my life. I went around the front and saw Teresa’s friends. The first thing they said was, “Where’s Teresa?”.
I remember when our parents couldn’t find Teresa in any of the hospitals my dad went upstairs to his room and broke down crying. I went up to him and said, “Da, we’ll find her”. He apologised for crying. [He] was dead within two years. We think the shock of the Stardust killed him.
There was so much we missed about Teresa. She should have been a bridesmaid at my wedding and godmother to one of my children. At all family get-togethers, she is always missed.
Her death has left a huge hole in my heart. To this day I still miss my sister, Teresa McDonnell.