Irish Woman Drowns in Lake

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Irish Voice News

Irish Woman Drowns in Lake

July 16, 2008

By April Drew

A BARTENDER from Limerick drowned in a New Hampshire lake after getting into difficulty on Saturday, July 5.

Anita O’Donnell, 31, who had been living in Boston for several years, was on a camping vacation with her friends at Lake Iona in New Hampshire when she died. O’Donnell was apparently wading in a seven foot deep area of the vast lake when she lost control and screamed for help.

O’Donnell, who could not swim, was pulled out of the water while other campers tried to save her life, but it was too late.

O’Donnell, who was from Corbally in Co. Limerick, was taken to Memorial Hospital in the nearby town of North Conway where she was pronounced dead.

Lynn Ott, a close friend of O’Donnell’s, described the 4’ 8” victim as the “most amazing person” she has ever met.

According to Ott, O’Donnell’s favorite sport was snowboarding.

“She liked being outside and she used to tell me stories of her going snowboarding and I couldn’t stop laughing because she was this tiny little girl,” remembers Ott fondly.

O’Donnell, who went to the Limerick Institute of Technology and worked in Tralee, Co. Kerry in a bar before coming to the U.S., was a bar manager at Durty Nelly’s in downtown Boston for nearly three years.

“Daytime bartenders in Boston really don’t make that much money but Anita made money because she was great at what she did. She was so spunky and outgoing and happy all the time,” Ott, who has temporarily taken over O’Donnell’s job, told the Irish Voice on Monday.

“She would talk to everyone and their mother when they’d come in to the bar. She was just one of those people who was completely genuine,” she said.

Ott said day in and day out, O’Donnell would sit, and whether she wanted to or not would listen intently to her customers’ woes. And more often than not she offered them advice from the heart.

“She’d look people in the eye and tell you as it was whether you wanted to hear it or not. She was really genuine,” she said.

Friends and customers gathered in Dorchester, O’Donnell’s home for the past number of years, last Wednesday and Thursday to bid her farewell.

“There were people that showed up at the wake the other day who had met her only twice,” said Ott.

One man who was at the same campsite as O’Donnell and had just met her a few times over the course of her vacation read O’Donnell’s obituary in the paper. “He felt he needed to be there,” said Ott.

O’Donnell’s remains were flown home to Ireland last Friday and buried in Corbally on Sunday. She is survived by her parents, Christopher and Marie, her brother Mark and sister Nicola.

O’Donnell’s death is one of many recent drowning accidents associated with young Irish people abroad. Last week, 20-year-old Brian Farrelly from Drimnagh in Dublin drowned after jumping into a pool in Ibiza. Similarly, Keith Murphy, also 20, from Tallaght in Dublin drowned in a swimming pool in the Canary Islands in May.

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