Leaving Certificate student Nikki Murphy was a dreamer who had got what she wanted in her exam to realise her dream of studying midwifery as a step to becoming a radiographer, her mother told mourners at her funeral in Co Tipperary.
Nikki, who died along with her friends, Zoey Coffey and Grace McSweeney and Grace’s brother, Luke when they were involved in a car crash near Clonmel as they headed out to celebrate their Leaving Cert results last Friday, was buried on Thursday in her home village of Kilcash.
Hundreds of mourners packed the Church of St John the Baptist in the shadow of Slievenamon to support Nikki’s grieving parents, Declan and Serena and her siblings, Zoe and Ryan in the first of the funerals for the four victims of the Clonmel tragedy.
Fighting back tears as she delivered a eulogy to her 18-year-old daughter, Ms Murphy said that Nikki was “truly beautiful inside and out and we always told her that she lit up a room when she walked in and she was the life and soul of our family especially at Christmas.
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“We only had Nikki for 18 years, but they were amazing – she was so caring and too good for this world – I was so lucky to have been her mother and I thank God every day for giving her to me – we wish we could have had her for eternity but now she will live in our hearts forever.
“We were always so proud of her and on Friday, August 25th, she got her Leaving Cert results – she got 531 points – she was so thrilled – she couldn’t believe the results she had gotten, she triple-checked them – at one point she even thought she was in someone else’s account.
“She never truly believed in herself until that moment, and she started to believe she could achieve her goals in life. We went out to breakfast that morning and we were sitting at the table planning her future, she was planning to go to Cork to study midwifery, but her end goal was radiography.
“She dreamed of that job since she was a little girl but she never believed that she could achieve that goal.
“Nikki had a bright and good future but that evening her dreams were taken from her – our lives will never be the same, our family is now left with broken dreams and broken hearts … God bless my beautiful baby girl and may she still be following her dreams somewhere more beautiful than here.
“I just want to finish by saying may God bless the families of Luke, Grace, and Zoey and that we may find peace after this tragedy,” said Ms Murphy as she thanked all those who had supported the family in so many ways over the past few days since the tragedy.
The funerals of Grace (18) and Luke (24) take place in Clonmel on Friday and Zoey (18) will be buried following a funeral Mass in Clonmel on Saturday.
Nikki’s classmates from the Loreto Convent in Clonmel arrived with their teachers at the Church of St John the Baptist over an hour before mass was due to start to form a guard of honour.
But the drizzle and the mist cleared as the clouds disappeared and the sun emerged to shine as the Murphy family wheeled Nikki’s white coffin past them into the church where parish priest of Kilcash and Kilsheelan, Fr Brian Power welcomed them.
Also there to sympathise with the Murphy family were President Michael D Higgins, Comdt Claire Mortimer, aide de-camp to the Taoiseach Leo Varadkar, Minister for Education Norma Foley, the Mayor of Clonmel, Cllr Richie Molloy and Bishop of Waterford and Lismore, Dr Alphonsus Cullinane.
Fr Power told mourners that it was appropriate that Nikki was returning home to the Church of St John the Baptist as it was the scene of so many joyful occasions in her life, where she had been baptised, received her First Holy Communion and had received Confirmation from Bishop Cullinane.
“Nikki was a caring, kind, loving person. This was something that she learned from her mum and dad, and this was reflected in the vocation of midwife that she wished to pursue,” said Fr Power, adding the presence of so many her of friends was testament to “the wonderful person that she was.”
He said that as they gathered to support the Murphy family, they were also conscious of the McSweeney and Coffey families who were mourning the loss of Grace and Luke, and Zoey while they were also conscious of the victims of the Cashel crash who were experiencing similar grief and pain.
“The question we ask ourselves is: ‘Why did it happen?’ and we ask ourselves this over and over again. We can never fully explain this and the reasons are never clear. Our faith doesn’t promise to stop bad things from happening, but, rather, that God will be with us, as we live through his love.”
Symbols were presented before the altar - a Christmas tree representing Nikki’s “love of Christmas, a family time”; rosary beads, representing her strong belief in God; an apron, representing her love of baking; a pack of chewing gum and her concertina, representing her love of music.
Afterwards outside the church, hundreds of teenagers, many in school uniforms, hugged each other, grappling with their grief as their friend’s remains were brought from the church and laid to rest in the adjoining graveyard beside her grandfather, Billy.
