Fittest Family contestant's father on sudden death of 15-year-old

The family of Ireland's Fittest Family contestant Cillian Flaherty have spoken about the sudden death of the 15-year-old, who was later found to have died from Sudden Arrhythmic Death Syndrome (SADS), a condition linked to abnormal heart rhythms.

Cillian, from Blanchardstown in Dublin, was found dead in bed by his father on Monday, 21 October 2024, just days before his family's scheduled appearance on the RTÉ programme.

Speaking to Prime Time, his father Paul Flaherty said the past two years had been "devastating" for the family.

The day before he died, Cillian had played for Mountview Boys & Girls FC's under-16 team, delivering what his father described as a man-of-the-match performance.

"He was in great humour all that day," Paul recalled. "There was nothing to say what was going to happen during the night."

The following morning, Paul went in to wake Cillian for school.

"I just bent over to make sure. I was shaking and I was just screaming for [his wife] Paula," he said. "And then Paula came in and she just looked in the door. It was like she knew the way I shouted for her… she knew that something wasn't right."

Paul called emergency services and began CPR under instructions from a call handler.

"I remember the guy telling me, 'Do not be afraid to hurt him. You have to do this really, really hard.’"

Despite the efforts of paramedics, Cillian could not be revived.

"We just had to wait outside," Paul said. "The guy came down then and he just said, 'It's been a couple of hours and there's nothing we could do.'"

Paul and Paula went upstairs to be with Cillian. "We knew that when he gets taken away, that the next time he comes back, it's going to be in a coffin," said Paul,

"The next few days after that, there was carnage. There were so many people - friends, family, and neighbours.I never knew there was so many 15 and 16-year-olds around Blanchardstown. There were just, there was just swarms of them."

'Passionate about football’

Cillian's death came as a shock to a family for whom fitness and sport had always been a central part of life.

From Whitestown, beside the Blanchardstown Shopping Centre, Paul and Paula had three children – sons Cian and Cillian and their younger sister Heidi.

"Cillian was 15 years of age, fit as a fiddle. He was a midfielder and a very good player. He was a really strong and pleasant lad. He wouldn't give you any lip, he wouldn't give you any cheek. He was just a really good lad."

"He was very passionate about his football, and he was only starting to get into the boxing."

Fitness is a huge part of life for the Flaherty family, who built their own gym at their home in Dublin 15 and were delighted when they successfully applied to take part in Ireland’s Fittest Family.

Cian boxed for years while Paul and Paula were always into going to the gym, running, weightlifting, Cross Fit and Hyrox training.

"We had a good selection of fitness, and we tried to drive that into the kids as they were getting older," said Paul.

Sudden Arrhythmic Death Syndrome

Following the post-mortem examination, the Flaherty family learned that Cillian had died from SADS.

"He was in bed and he was asleep, so we didn't know. You find yourself being guilty saying, ‘why did I not go in and check?’ But, who's going to know? Who's going to think something like that?" Paul said.

According to the Irish Heart Foundation, SADS is used to describe a sudden and unexpected death where no clear cause is found after a full post-mortem. It is believed to be caused by an abnormal heart rhythm.

Cillian's death is one of around 100 sudden cardiac deaths among young people in Ireland each year, according to the Irish Heart Foundation.

The Flaherty family say they would like to see greater awareness of cardiac screening, and believe wider access could help prevent other families experiencing a similar loss.

"If there was more screening out there, if they gave it a bigger profile and advertised screening, then people could go get themselves checked before something like that actually happens," Paul said.

"We went and we got checked and thank God we're alright. But, we didn't know that Cillian had it either. That's the first time that anything like that happened in our family," he added.

He said he would like to see screening made available more widely, including in schools, so that it reaches beyond those involved in organised sport.

The family have also encouraged people to undertake CPR training.

"You could be walking through a park and it could happen to somebody else," Paul said. "But if people do make that decision to get trained, you have that chance to help a friend, a family member, or even a stranger."

‘The toughest thing’

The second annual 5km memorial run for Cillian Flaherty took place in Hartstown Park in west Dublin last Saturday, on what would have been his 17th birthday. Around 500 people from the local community attended.

Twenty months on from Cillian’s sudden death, the run is important for his older brother Cian.

"He was only 15 when he passed. It was the toughest thing that I've ever went through in my life," said Cian.

"There are no words that can explain what Cillian meant to me, the rest of my family or anyone in the neighbourhood. Nobody ever had a bad thing to say about him," he added.

"He loved running, football, anything got to do with sport. That's the reason we do the run.

"It was a short life, but some memories will never go away, ever."

Watch Conor McMorrow and producer/director Aaron Heffernan’s interview with Paul Flaherty on the 23 June edition of Prime Time at 9.35pm on RTÉ One and the RTÉ Player.

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