{"id":249582,"date":"2025-12-24T17:44:22","date_gmt":"2025-12-24T17:44:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/249582\/"},"modified":"2025-12-24T17:44:22","modified_gmt":"2025-12-24T17:44:22","slug":"cork-girl-13-who-lost-legs-in-farming-accident-returns-home-for-christmas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/249582\/","title":{"rendered":"Cork girl (13) who lost legs in farming accident returns home for Christmas"},"content":{"rendered":"

F\u00e9ile O’Sullivan has had over sixty operations since she had a tractor accident on July 2 last in her native Allihies.<\/p>\n

She was airlifted to Cork University Hospital (CUH) in the aftermath of the accident. A week later F\u00e9ile was transferred to Crumlin Children\u2019s Hospital in Dublin where she has remained since.<\/p>\n

Earlier this year her mother Maureen said that getting her daughter home for Christmas was the priority. She stated that at one point it felt like \u201cChristmas was never coming.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cllr Finbarr Harrington, who has worked on the fundraising campaign for the teenager, told C103FM that F\u00e9ile made a very special journey from Dublin yesterday.<\/p>\n

\"F\u00e9ile's<\/p>\n

F\u00e9ile’s welcome home party.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is brilliant. It has been a rollercoaster. We can only imagine what Maureen and F\u00e9ile have been through. Thankfully, F\u00e9ile made the 400km long journey yesterday from Crumlin Hospital yesterday by Bumbleance.<\/p>\n

A load of people turned up to welcome her home and to wish her well along the way with many having bonfires lighting on the road.<\/p>\n

It really illustrates how happy and grateful people are that F\u00e9ile is home. F\u00e9ile has been in hospital since July 2.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Independent councillor, who is a spokesperson for the family, said that F\u00e9ile is so grateful for all that has been done for her since her accident.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we think back to that day we must thank and acknowledge the local first responders, the local fire brigade, the local gardai, and the air ambulance crew that attended that day and the staff at CUH and Crumlin for taking such good care of F\u00e9ile.<\/p>\n

\"F\u00e9ile<\/p>\n

F\u00e9ile O’Sullivan.<\/p>\n

Today’s News in 90 Seconds – Wednesday, December 24th<\/p>\n

They are truly amazing people and because of their actions F\u00e9ile made it home yesterday.\u201d<\/p>\n

The plan was to bring F\u00e9ile home by air ambulance. However, heavy fog meant that she had to make the journey by road.<\/p>\n

Cllr Harrington told show host Patricia Messinger that Maureen and F\u00e9ile were \u201chellbent\u201d on getting home. He said that heavy fog was not going to get in the way of their family Christmas in Allihies.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey had arranged to meet some of the first responders that attended that day and then they went on to Maureen\u2019s parents Martin and Mary who didn\u2019t know about the journey home so it was a big surprise for them. It is going to be a great Christmas for them. It has been an unbelievably difficult year for them all.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"F\u00e9ile's<\/p>\n

F\u00e9ile’s welcome home party.<\/p>\n

He said that it was hard to keep the secret of their arrival from F\u00e9ile\u2019s grandparents.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe somehow managed to keep it from her grandparents which was a beautiful surprise for them. They are over the moon”.<\/p>\n

F\u00e9ile is hoping to be home for at least six days over Christmas. She will head back to Crumlin for a period and then on to D\u00fan Laoghaire for rehab after that.<\/p>\n

Her ambition was always to get home as soon as she could and try to be back with her classmates before the end of the school year. That is still do able. Yesterday marks a major milestone.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cllr Harrington said that F\u00e9ile is very much looking at what she can do as opposed to what she can\u2019t do going in to the future.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe is a 13 year old kid and the way she reacts and deals with things is unbelievably positive. The staff can\u2019t get over the mindset and positivity she has.\u201d<\/p>\n

A GoFundMe page for F\u00e9ile officially closes today. Cllr Harrington said that he and members of the steering group want to thank everybody who made the fundraising drive a huge success.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe GoFundMe page is currently at \u20ac778,000. But when you add on all the monies that will come in from the recent fundraisers and some that are being done in the Spring then this been fundraiser will exceed over a million euro.\u201d<\/p>\n

F\u00e9ile will require additional surgery and intensive rehabilitation, specialist care, physio therapy, emotional support and home adaptations.<\/p>\n

Cllr Harrington adds that F\u00e9ile is really looking forward to catching up with her friends in the coming days.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no place like home. Yesterday she said she was looking forward to having spuds (lovingly prepared by her Grandad) for dinner.<\/p>\n

\u201cChristmas is a special time. It is a really nice time for families. We hope that Maureen and F\u00e9ile will enjoy it \u201c<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"F\u00e9ile O’Sullivan has had over sixty operations since she had a tractor accident on July 2 last in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":249583,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[9,10,18,13,14,6,19,17,11,23,12,15,16,5,81745,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-249582","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-eire","11":"tag-featured-news","12":"tag-featurednews","13":"tag-headlines","14":"tag-ie","15":"tag-ireland","16":"tag-latest-news","17":"tag-latest-news-ticker","18":"tag-latestnews","19":"tag-main-news","20":"tag-mainnews","21":"tag-news","22":"tag-news-in-90-seconds","23":"tag-top-stories","24":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115775791572670850","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249582","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=249582"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249582\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/249583"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=249582"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=249582"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=249582"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}