91-year-old widow died of smoke inhalation in fire

A 91-YEAR-OLD widow died of smoke inhalation after a small fire broke out in her living room, an inquest heard yesterday.

Cork Coroner’s Court was told that a piece of fabric, perhaps a tea-towel, which had been draped over a real leather couch came in contact with a two-bar electric heater that Bridget O’Donoughue used to heat the living room of her two-storey, three bedroom terraced house, Sunnynook, in Blackrock village, Cork.

The fabric caught fire and spread the blaze onto the couch. Fire retardant (or resistant) material in the couch prevented the blaze from taking hold and flame damage was confined to a corner of the living room.

But the smouldering blaze generated a huge amount of thick black smoke which caused extensive damage to the room.

The inquest was told that Ms Donoughue was probably overcome by carbon monoxide in the smoke.

She was found by her daughter, Clare Corey, lying in a corner of the room at about 11.20am on Monday, May 14 last.

Ms Corey, and her brother Peter, took turns to visit their mother at her home.

When she called that Monday, Ms Corey opened the front door to find hot smoke in the hallway and the smoke alarm sounding faintly. She opened the door to the living room and saw it was filled with thick black smoke. She then discovered her mother lying on the ground.

She dragged her outside and alerted the emergency services. Three units of Cork City Fire Brigade arrived at the scene at 11.34am and extinguished a small fire.

Ms Donoughue was rushed to Cork University Hospital but was pronounced dead on arrival. She suffered no burn injuries but an autopsy revealed extensive soot deposition in the trachea and carbon monoxide levels in the blood of 31%.

A level of 50% is considered fatal in a young healthy person but in the elderly, levels much lower can be fatal. There was no evidence of alcohol or of prescribed medicines. Cause of death was smoke inhalation due to a house fire in association with heart disease.

The court was told that Ms Donoughue was alive when the fire started but was probably overcome by carbon monoxide, a colourless odourless toxic gas.

Detective Garda Derry Griffin ruled out an electrical fault as the cause of the blaze and said he was satisfied it was the fabric touching the heater which started the fire.

But he was unable to say how long the fire had been burning. The jury returned a verdict of accidental death.

Mr O’Donoughue told city coroner, Dr Myra Cullinane, that his mother was relatively agile, healthy, and was fiercely independent.

She had been in very good form when he visited the previous Saturday, he said.

Dr Cullinane said: “This is a tragic ending to what was a lengthy and independent life. But she would have lost consciousness very early in the process and would not have been aware of what was happening.”

Mr Donoughue said it was some comfort to the family that she would not have suffered in the moments before her death.