An inquest has heard that a British college student fell to her death in front of her classmates after slipping in a huge puddle on Ireland’s famous Cliffs of Moher.
Roxan Bastaens, a 20-year-old Belgian citizen studying at the University of Edinburgh, went hiking in the west of Ireland last May, just a few weeks before her 21st birthday.
The Clare Coroner’s Court in Kilrush heard that she and three friends, two French students and Giulia Bracchi, who was born in Italy, had come to Doolin the night before to stay before going on the cliff walk.
Ms. Bracchi talked about how the group left that morning when the weather was good and they had the correct hiking boots.
She told the court, “At first, the trail was safe, but later it got slippery and there was no barrier.”
She said, “We all wore hiking boots.” It wasn’t hard at all. A lot of people were on the cliffs. It looked like the path was safe.
She said that Bastaens was holding her camera and watching her step as she walked to avoid a pool of water.
Ms. Bracchi remembered that “she was walking around a big puddle with her camera in her hand and looking at her steps.” “She fell forward and started to roll down. I attempted to capture her, but I couldn’t. It all happened so fast.
“I saw her hit the cliffs twice before she disappeared,” she added. Not long after, she saw her friend’s body lying face down in the ocean below.
Last year, only a few weeks before her 21st birthday, Bastaens died in a horrific way at the Cliffs of Moher in Ireland.
Isobel O’Dea, the county coroner, said that the death was an accident. She told the family, “Sadly, we have many deaths at the Cliffs of Moher every year, and this was completely unplanned.”
Toxicology testing showed that Bastaens did not have any drugs or alcohol in his system. A postmortem showed that she died immediately away from the many injuries she sustained when she fell. Ms. O’Dea said that her death “would have been instant, and she wouldn’t have felt any pain.”
In August, the Clare Local Development Company closed off big parts of the walking path, which are still closed for safety reasons.
In the previous few years, a lot of people have died at the Cliffs of Moher. Every year, about 1.5 million individuals go to the site.
Experts say that the area needs “serious construction work” to be safe. People are also anxious that the trail is too close to the brink of the cliff.
Last July, a 12-year-old fell into a puddle and died right away. People reported he was taking a photo when he toppled over the monument in 2019.
