*Tom & Liam Madigan. Photograph: Amanda Åström
TWO Kilrush men witnessed Sunday’s mass shooting at Bondi Beach which claimed the lives of fifteen people in Australia.
Father and son, Tom and Liam Madigan were in an apartment overlooking Bondi Beach at the time of Sunday’s attack which targeted Australia’s Jewish community at a a Hanukkah event on Sydney’s Bondi Beach.
Fifteen people including a 10-year-old girl were killed in the attack. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese described it as “act of antisemitism” and also one of “terrorism”.
Liam was visiting his father in his apartment right on Bondi Beach where he could hear bangs. “It sounded like fireworks or something so I went to the window and saw shots being fired and all the people running”.
They were a few dozen metres away from the attack. Mass shootings in Australia are very rare, this attack is the country’s deadliest incident since 1996, when a gunman killed 35 people during the Port Arthur massacre.
Tom outlined, “It was right in front of our eyes. We saw about six bodies on the ground”.
Both Tom and Liam were not allowed to leave the house for a few hours, on the request of the police.
Speaking to TT, Liam said, “It’s scary. It happened right outside our door. The world is a scary place right now. The weapons they had were huge, like in a movie. Everything looked like in a movie”.
A former footballer with Kilrush Shamrocks and Kilrush Rangers, Liam left for Australia in 2022. He lined out with the Shams when they last contested in the Clare SFC in 2021 while he also represented Clare at underage level.
