Passenger lay dead on bus for two hours

A CORONER is to ask Bus Éireann to review its procedures after an inquest heard how a man lay dead on a bus for almost two hours after he choked on raw meat.

Jim McCarthy, 37, who lived in an apartment on Grattan Hill, Cork, was found choked to death on the back seat of a bus as it drove along Lavitt’s Quay in Cork at around 1.40pm on July 8, 2010.

Cork City Coroner’s Court was told that Mr McCarthy boarded the bus at Wolfe Tone Street, on the northside of the city, carrying a white plastic bag, at about 11.51am. He sat on the back seat.

One of the bus’s CCTV cameras, located behind him, showed him rummaging in the bag just after midday before he was seen slumping to his left in the chair.

But he wasn’t discovered until 1.38pm — an hour and 47 minutes after he boarded — when a passenger raised the alarm with the bus driver.

Another passenger, Jude Coffey, said Mr McCarthy had turned blue, and she saw a piece of meat by his head.

An ambulance was called and paramedics found a chunk of meat lodged in his throat. They found no signs of life.

Mr McCarthy was taken to the Mercy University Hospital where he was pronounced dead.

A postmortem revealed he had suffered a fatal heart attack after a piece of raw pork chop became lodged in his throat.

Assistant state pathologist, Dr Margaret Bolster said he had high levels of alcohol in his system, and therapeutic traces of the sedative benzodiazepine, which combined to suppress his gag reflex.

City coroner, Dr Myra Cullinane, recorded a verdict of misadventure.

Coskun Kizilay was on duty that day, driving the bus on the Number 2 route which links Knocknaheeny, on the northside of the city, to Mahon on the southside.

He told Dr Cullinane he saw Mr McCarthy board and watched in his rear view mirror as he took his seat. A garda investigation found Mr McCarthy was the only passenger on the bus at the time of his collapse.

As the bus continued to Mahon, more passengers boarded but no one noticed Mr McCarthy lying prone on the back seat.

Mr Kizilay told Dr Cullinane that the bus does not have a terminus and he is not in a position to leave the driver’s cab and check his vehicle until his shift is over, and he returns it to the city’s main bus depot.

The bus was making its way along Merchants Quay heading back to Knocknaheeny when the tragedy became apparent.

Mr Kizilay said he didn’t notice anything unusual until a passenger raised the alarm on Lavitt’s Quay.

Bus Éireann chief inspector Tim O’Leary told Dr Cullinane that such incidents don’t “normally happen” and Bus Éireann has not made any changes to its procedures.

But Dr Cullinane said part of her duty is to highlight issues to prevent similar tragedies.

She would bring the inquest proceedings to the attention of Bus Éireann’s regional manager, Joe Fitzgerald, with a view to a review being carried out on the company’s procedures to prevent future similar tragedies.