A Wicklow man who died from severe head injuries sustained when he fell from a fourth-floor balcony in Thailand was trying to get into his friend’s apartment without disturbing the neighbours, an inquest heard.
A major fundraising drive had been raised after his injury to help the family meet medical bills.
Robert Robinson (32), Carrigbeg, Ashford, Co Wicklow, died at Beaumont Hospital on July 20th last year, one month after he fell from the apartment block in Bangkok’s Lat Krabang district.
Dublin Coroner’s Court heard that he had just spent six weeks in Ireland for his mother’s 50th birthday and his best friend’s wedding. He was stopping off to visit a friend on his way back to New Zealand, where he had been working as a scaffolder in Christchurch.
His mother Martina Fox told the inquest he had been due to stay in Bangkok for three days. On the second night, June 21st, she got a call from his friend telling her that her son was “after having a fall”.
“He said: ‘It is very serious, I don’t think he is going to survive’,” she said. “I just couldn’t believe it.”
There was no investigation by Thai police into the fall. Ms Fox said the family pieced together what had happened from speaking to Mr Robinson’s friend and his neighbour.
New apartment
The friend had just moved into a new apartment with his two children and he and his friend went for two drinks on the second night. He returned to the apartment to let the babysitter go and Mr Robinson, who did not have a key, followed on shortly afterwards. The incident happened at about 12.40am.
“He was trying to get into the apartment, knocking on the door. The neighbour looked out of the apartment as if to say: ‘You’re waking everybody up’.
“Rob was afraid he would wake the kids. He was a scaffolder, the window to the bedroom was open and he stood up on the balcony, reached around to get into the bedroom and he fell,” said Ms Fox. She said he was “hugely experienced with heights” and “wouldn’t have thought anything of it”.
Ms Fox told the coroner the family struggled with language barriers as they tried to deal with medics administering her son’s care. When she arrived in Thailand, the doctors wanted to turn his life support off.
The family tried to find someone in Beaumont Hospital who could talk to the doctors and understand the scans. On the eighth day, Mr Robinson moved his head but they were told this was not possible. A subsequent brain stem test showed minimal activity.
Mr Robinson’s case was the subject of a major fundraising drive as the family faced mounting medical bills.
Air ambulance
Ms Fox told the inquest that the bill for the hospital was “thousands”. They organised to fly him home on a passenger flight to London and he was taken from there to Beaumont Hospital by air ambulance.
“I was just convinced that if we got him home, he would be okay,” she said.
However, he never regained consciousness and died on July 20th, following confirmation of brain stem death. Two people were the recipients of organ donation in the wake of his death.
The postmortem found that death was due to severe, traumatic head injuries. Ms Fox told coroner Dr Brian Farrell that she is “haunted” by the possibility that her son might have recovered. However, Dr Farrell said the tests carried out at Beaumont confirmed there was “no chance of recovery”.
He returned a verdict of accidental death.