An excavator driver who worked tirelessly until the last body was recovered from the Creeslough tragedy said he was spurred on by the sight of the victims’ families devastated.
The explosion in Co Donegal on October 7 last year killed and injured eight people.
The dead were five-year-old Shauna Flanagan Garwe and her father Robert Garwe (50), Catherine O’Donnell (39) and her son James Monaghan (13), Leona Harper (14), Jessica Gallagher (24), James O’Flaherty ( 48), Martin McGill (49), Martina Martin (49) and Hugh Kelly (59).
Gardaí are still investigating the cause of the explosion and a gas explosion remains a major line of investigation.
The Kraoslach. Photo credit: TG4
Excavator operator Henry Gallagher, 47, from Treantagh, near Letterkenny, has spoken publicly for the first time about the new TG4 current affairs series.
Mr Gallagher discussed how he could see the victims’ grieving loved ones in his rear-view mirror as he desperately searched for survivors.
He volunteered to take part in the recovery operation after pleading for help from the fire department at the scene of the explosion. Mr Gallagher was told by one of the lead firefighters that there were “so many bodies inside and we can’t get to them”.
“You just see a river of safety vests and I know families are waiting for news underneath. The only way they will get the news of a loved one being taken out is for me to come in,” he said.
‘I wanted them out. I would have stayed in that digger for ages after that until I got the bodies out.
Mr Gallagher remained in the cab of his excavator for 24 hours removing debris from the collapsed building until the last body of ten, that of 14-year-old Leona Harper, was recovered.
The teenager’s mother, Donna Harper, praised Mr Gallagher for praise at her daughter’s funeral.
“I did what anyone else would have done. The common people were great. I mean, I’ve heard stories of people running into the building, people moving other people out of the building. They took people out and they cried (and) they screamed. Every person we knocked out wasn’t crying or screaming,” Mr Gallagher told the TG4 documentary Inspection – A Craoslach.
The program explores how the local people of the village of Donegal came together in the immediate aftermath of the explosion to search through the rubble and rescue their neighbors before emergency services arrived on the scene.
Lorry driver Colin Kilpatrick from Raphoe, County Donegal, who was making a delivery in Cresslough, witnessed the explosion and was one of the first rescuers in the garage forecourt, where he managed to help free one of the injured by using a car jack. use to lift concrete slabs.
“People got out and people didn’t get away, but what we did worked,” he said.
The program is the first of a new six-part monthly current affairs and investigative documentary that takes a look at the headlines of major Irish news stories to be broadcast on TG4 this year.
Kevin Magee. Photo credit: TG4.
The series is presented by award-winning Belfast investigative journalist Kevin Magee, who said: “At the time of the tragic event in Creeslough, we heard about the extraordinary bravery and bravery of the first wave of rescuers, local neighbors trapped before emergency services arrived on the scene. This program gives a voice to the ordinary people who have helped and hear in their own words the extraordinary things they have done, often at great risk to themselves in the face of terrible adversity.
Iniúchadh TG4 will air on Wednesday, February 8 at 9:30 PM and will also be available worldwide on the TG4 Player.