Community rallies around Louisiana family after World Cup tragedy. It was supposed to be the trip of a lifetime. Now a Louisiana family is trapped in a logistical and financial nightmare, absorbing the grief of one child's sudden death while trying to secure safe passage home for another gravely injured child halfway across the world.
Danny Murphy of Lafayette, La., set off for the World Cup in South Africa this month with the four youngest of his six children: Danielle, 17, Brian, 19, Kellie, 21, and Nicole, 24. The close-knit family had been planning the trip for three years.
"Soccer is life to this family," Carrie Roy, a close friend of the Murphy family, told Yahoo! News. "Going to the World Cup meant everything to them."
After a match June 15, they gathered at a Cape Town pub near their hotel. Danielle's eyes became irritated by cigarette smoke, so Danny Murphy took her back to their hotel, leaving Brian, Kellie and Nicole at the pub.
According to Roy, the three remained there for a few hours, savoring the World Cup experience and swapping stories. They were headed to the hotel on a walkway when a drunk driver veered off the road and plowed into them.
Nicole, an Army reservist and Louisiana State University medical school student who once helped lead her collegiate soccer team to a national championship, was killed instantly. Brian suffered severe head injuries resulting in significant brain swelling. (Kellie suffered only a concussion.)
Here's where the Murphys' south Louisiana community comes in.
Brian has remained in a medically induced coma since then — and his family lacks the funds to transport him to Lafayette and care for him close to home. Here's a photo of Brian and Nicole, at their sister Lauren's wedding in May:
Brian's recovery is expected to be a long one. It could be weeks, even months, before he's released from the hospital. His mother, Charlene, is "having a really tough time right now," Roy said, and the family has been hoping that Brian can be transported back to Louisiana once his condition stabilizes. But the Murphys' health insurer refuses to pay for any medical transport back.
Kellie and Danielle — both members of the LSU women's soccer team — have returned home to lend support to their distraught mother, leaving Danny alone at Brian's bedside in South Africa.
Nicole's body arrived in Lafayette on Monday, Roy explained, "and they're desperate to have the whole family together for her funeral and to be there for Brian during his recovery. He still doesn't know that his sister is gone."
So the locals — many of them suffering economic hardships of their own in the wake of the Gulf oil catastrophe — are raising money to help defray some of the family's expenses, now estimated at upward of $300,000. All across Louisiana, individuals, small-business owners and soccer organizations are holding fundraisers, with a local bank setting up a special account to deposit charitable donations.
News of the Murphy family's plight has spread virally through email chains, blog posts and social media like Facebook and Twitter. Pop crooner John Mayer even got into the act, taking to his Tumblr blog to ask his fans to give support to the Murphy family. "We all have a lot to celebrate this Fourth of July weekend," Mayer wrote, "so let’s make an offering of appreciation for our own blessings by helping a family reunite in the midst of a terrible tragedy."
Roy said: "If there's one bright side to all of this, it's all the love that people have shown for the family. All sorts of people are doing fundraisers. Everybody's just been so giving." ( yahoo.com )
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