Riverdance Honours Eithne''s Memory

7 June 2010

The Royal Victoria Eye & Ear Hospital Research Foundation is delighted that a group of Riverdancers will be honouring and celebrating the memory of Dr Eithne Walls by running the 2010 Mini Marathon on Monday June 7th and all moneys raised by the group will be donated to Eithne's research fund. Eithne joined Riverdance in 1998 as a member of the Flying Squad and then danced fulltime with the Shannon production of Riverdance on Broadway. She later went on to join the Foyle for its first run in the Gaiety in Dublin in 2004. All who performed with her would agree that Eithne was someone who once you had met you would never forget.

13 Riverdancers past and present, will be running in the event, alongside Eithne's sister Kathryn and friends. The numbers of Riverdancers running would have been greater were it not for a number of individuals already being committed to running for other causes and others being tied-up on tour.

The Riverdancers in full are:

• Michelle Buffini
• Nicola Byrne
• Zara Curtis
• Maeve Donohoe
• Maeve Fearon
• Susan Ginnety
• Paula Goulding
• Niamh McCormack
• Dervla McGee
• Aisling McVeigh
• Caitlin NicGabhann
• Carla O'Brien
• Catherine O'Brien

Dr Eithne Walls

On 1 June 2009 Dr Eithne Walls, along with her two friends and colleagues Dr Aisling Butler and Dr Jane Deasy, was a passenger on the ill-fated flight AF447 which disappeared over the Atlantic as it travelled from Rio de Janeiro to Paris.

Eithne was a doctor in RVEEH and just starting out on her exciting journey to fulfilling a lifelong ambition of becoming an eye surgeon. She was a gifted, vibrant and special person and her loss has had a profound impact on all who were privileged to know her.

Following this tragic accident Eithne’s family established a research fund at the Research Foundation in her memory. This fund supports the vital research work of the Research Foundation into eye disease.


Support the research foundation