{"id":8778,"date":"2025-08-19T06:41:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-19T06:41:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/8778\/"},"modified":"2025-08-19T06:41:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-19T06:41:08","slug":"builder-restores-home-destroyed-by-ballyfermot-arson-attack-for-free-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/8778\/","title":{"rendered":"Builder restores home destroyed by Ballyfermot arson attack for free \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Dublin<\/a> family whose home was severely damaged in an arson attack three months ago have moved back into their house following the help of a local builder. <\/p>\n

Pat Curran had fallen asleep on his couch in the early hours of May 21st when his home on Landen Road in Ballyfermot was subject to a firebomb attack, in what garda\u00ed said was a case of mistaken identity<\/a>.<\/p>\n

His wife Breda and their son Luke (20) were asleep upstairs. The family escaped the fire, but their pet dog Zach died in the blaze. Mr Curran and his wife had no house insurance. <\/p>\n

\"TheThe Currans’ home following the May attack. Photograph: Dara Mac D\u00f3naill\/The Irish Times \"BredaBreda Curran looks at the damage to her home after the arson attack. Photograph: Dara Mac D\u00f3naill\/The Irish Times <\/p>\n

Builder Mark O\u2019Neill (42) from Clondalkin oversaw the complete house renovation, relying on the help of subcontractors and suppliers.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0\u2018Waking up in hell\u2019: Family subject to mistaken Dublin arson attack told \u2018it wasn\u2019t meant for youse\u2019Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Mr O\u2019Neill waived all costs, with such works estimated to be in the region of between \u20ac170,000 and \u20ac200,000, aided only by a GoFundMe page that raised more than \u20ac55,000.<\/p>\n

\"PatPat Curran and his wife Breda in the newly rebuilt home with builder and plasterer Mark O\u2019Neill. Photograph: Dara Mac D\u00f3naill\/The Irish Times <\/p>\n

The house had to be rewired, along with new plumbing, new joists, plastering and insulation, roof repairs and new windows and doors. <\/p>\n

Mr O\u2019Neill said he was \u201cdevastated\u201d when he heard what happened to the family and decided to take on the job after meeting them. <\/p>\n

\u201cI just knew I was meant to do it,\u201d he said. \u201cI get so much back from jobs like this. It\u2019s a different kind of payback seeing people being able to get back into their home.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou could not meet a nicer family. You\u2019re asking yourself how could this happen to such a nice family? But I also believe the good always outweighs the bad and I\u2019m blessed with my suppliers and people working with me over the years.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Photograph:Photograph: Dara Mac D\u00f3naill\/The Irish Times <\/p>\n

Mr O\u2019Neill has been working in construction since he was 15 and has helped others refurbish their homes following fires. He said the loss of his mother, sister and brother over recent years are part of the reason he has decided to take on such projects when he can.<\/p>\n

The family received the keys to their home on Saturday, describing the generosity of Mr O\u2019Neill and others as \u201ca miracle\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor me, Mark stepped down from heaven,\u201d Ms Curran said. \u201cI\u2019ve never met anybody like that. I walked out of here in May full of soot and said I can\u2019t go in there any more because I wasn\u2019t getting anywhere. I never came here until last Saturday. They just said: \u2018stay away, don\u2019t come back\u2019. <\/p>\n

\"Photograph:Photograph: Dara Mac D\u00f3naill\/The Irish Times <\/p>\n

\u201cI couldn\u2019t believe it. It was the goodness of Mark, family, friends, neighbours, the GoFundMe, because there was nothing out there in terms of grants. I did try, I emailed everyone but there was just nothing there. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe were hopeless and desolate for the first week and a half after it happened. We were saying: \u2018what are we going to do?\u2019\u201d <\/p>\n

Ms Curran, who is a social care worker, added that it \u201cwill take a while\u201d to get used to being in the house again.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just at night time, we\u2019re sleeping with the windows open because it\u2019s too warm and you might hear something on the road, a motorbike flying by,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m probably a little bit on high alert but that should go. I know that\u2019s your brain just trying to protect your body. I\u2019ll get through it.\u201d <\/p>\n

Mr Curran, an artist originally from Dolphin\u2019s Barn, added that walking back into his home again was \u201cnothing short of miraculous\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the way I feel about it. Basically we have the newest house on Landen Road,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s shone through all of this is the goodness of people. It makes me want to be a better person going forward … I\u2019m still a bit up and down. In all honesty, I think counselling is down the road for all of us. It was a near-death experience for the three of us. It shattered my confidence and made me more weary of people and danger. Mark deserves all the recognition he could get.\u201d<\/p>\n

Two boys aged 14 and 15 and a man in his 20s have been charged in connection with the attack.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Dublin family whose home was severely damaged in an arson attack three months ago have moved back…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8779,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[9,10,52,18,13,14,6,19,17,11,12,15,16,5,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-8778","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-dublin","11":"tag-eire","12":"tag-featured-news","13":"tag-featurednews","14":"tag-headlines","15":"tag-ie","16":"tag-ireland","17":"tag-latest-news","18":"tag-latestnews","19":"tag-main-news","20":"tag-mainnews","21":"tag-news","22":"tag-top-stories","23":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8778","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=8778"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8778\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8779"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8778"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8778"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8778"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}