A body has been found in the sea off the coast of Co Clare during the ongoing search for a missing boy near the Cliffs of Moher , now in its sixth day.
On Sunday morning around 10am, those aboard a leisure boat reported seeing something in the water about 2kms north of Doolin, where the Garda-led search was being coordinated. The boat's skipper immediately alerted authorities.
The Irish Coast Guard's marine rescue coordination centre in Kerry was notified and they in turn alerted the Doolin unit of the service, the RNLI and the Gardai . In response, Doolin Coast Guard launched their Delta rigid inflatable boat (rib) and the RNLI sent out its all-weather lifeboat based at Kilronan on Inis Mor.
Upon reaching the provided location, Doolin Coast Guard personnel quickly located a body. With help from RNLI volunteers, the remains were brought on board the Doolin Delta boat and taken back to Doolin Pier. From there, the body was moved to the nearby Coast Guard station, reports the Irish Mirror .
The RNLI lifeboat also accompanied the Coast Guard boat back to Doolin. The body has since been transported by hearse to University Hospital Limerick where formal identification will take place and a postmortem examination will be conducted.
A Garda spokesperson confirmed the search has now been stood down. " Following the recovery of a body this morning by Coast Guard, Sunday, 28th July, a coastal search operation for a young boy missing from the vicinity of the Cliffs of Moher, Co. Clare since Tuesday afternoon, 23rd July 2024, has been stood down. A file will now be prepared for the Coroner," said the spokesperson.
The multi-agency operation involved personnel from a total of eight counties who had been searching for the 12-year-old who was reported missing after he became separated from his mother during a visit to the Cliffs of Moher last Tuesday.
A land, air and sea search and rescue operation was mounted at around 2.00pm on Tuesday and continued until evening when sea conditions had started to deteriorate. That initial search involved the Irish Coast Guard's Doolin unit, the Aran Islands RNLI all-weather lifeboat, Rescue 115 and Gardai. On Wednesday morning, Clare Civil Defence dispatched members of their unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) team to launch a drone.
Divers from the Garda Water Unit and Doolin Coast Guard carried also undertook searches of the shoreline at the base of the cliffs on Wednesday however low cloud and mist hampered that operation. The Cleggan unit of the Coast Guard in Galway travelled to Clare to assist their Doolin colleagues using high-spec drones to search the cliff base and wider coastline.
Throughout the week, Civil Defence teams from Cork North, Cork West and Kerry dispatched drone teams to assist in the operation. Additional Civil Defence teams from Laois and Wicklow joined the search effort while another unit from Dublin was due to travel to Clare on Sunday.
In the meantime, members of Galway and Mayo Civil Defence conducted searches of the Galway Bay coastline as part of the operation. The Costello Bay unit of the Irish Coast Guard also searched areas along the Galway coastline while members of the Inis Oirr (Aran Islands) unit carried out shoreline searches in their area. This unit is land-based and is managed by the Doolin Coast Guard.
Watch officers at the Irish Coast Guard's marine rescue coordination centre in Kerry, who have been coordinating the air and sea searches, used drift modelling software in an effort to establish what direction a body might be carried.
The Shannon-based Irish Coast Guard helicopter Rescue 115 had also been carrying out searches along the Clare coastline and in Galway Bay.
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