A 20-year-old University of Edinburgh student slipped and fell to her death while walking on a muddy part of a trail beside the cliff edge at the Cliffs of Moher in May 2024, an inquest has heard.

At the Clare Coroner’s Court in Kilrush on Friday, eyewitness testimony of three college friends of Roxan Bastaens’ final moments before she fell was read out in evidence.

Members of her family had travelled to Kilrush for the inquest.

It heard that four female friends, two French, one Italian and Belgian national Bastaens had arrived at nearby Doolin the night before the incident with the intention of hiking in the area.

In her evidence, Italian-born college student, Guilia Bracchi said she was walking behind Bastaens when her friend fell.

“The trail was protected at the beginning, but later on it got slippery and there was no barrier,” she said.

Ms Bracchi said that conditions were calm and “we all had hiking boots on. It was not difficult. There were hundreds of people on the cliffs. The impression was that the trail was safe.”

Ms Bracchi said Bastaens had her camera in her hand and was looking at her steps as she walked around a big puddle.

She said she saw Bastaens’ foot going to the side where the trail was muddy and “she fell forward and she started tumbling down and I tried to catch her, but I couldn’t. It all happened so fast.”

Ms Bracchi added: “I looked down and I saw her hit off the cliffs twice and then she then went out of sight.” Moments later, she could see her friend’s body face down in the water.

Bastaens was weeks away from celebrating her 21st birthday.

County coroner Isobel O’Dea gave a verdict of “accidental death”. She told the family: “Unfortunately, we have a number of deaths at the Cliffs of Moher each year and this was an absolute accident.”

She said Bastaens’ blood sample was negative for any alcohol or drugs.

Ms O’Dea said that the postmortem found she died as a result of polytrauma as a result of a fall from a height. Bastaens’ death, she said, “would have been instantaneous and she wouldn’t have suffered”.

On August 22nd of last year, the Clare Local Development Company closed off large sections of the Cliffs of Moher trail, and they remain closed due to safety concerns.

The trial of a former paratrooper accused of the murder of two men on Bloody Sunday in Derry in 1972 is set to resume next week.

The non-jury trial at Belfast Crown Court will hear evidence from three men who survived the shootings as well as civilian witnesses and former soldiers.

It comes after Judge Patrick Lynch on Wednesday ruled that key hearsay evidence can be admitted as evidence in his trial.

He granted an application by the prosecution to admit a number of statements made by other soldiers on the ground during the shootings on January 30th, 1972, which the defence had argued were not reliable.

Members of the Parachute Regiment shot dead 13 civilians in Derry on Bloody Sunday after a civil rights march.

Soldier F, who cannot be identified, is accused of murdering James Wray and William McKinney.

He is also charged with five attempted murders during the incident in the city’s Bogside area, namely of Joseph Friel, Michael Quinn, Joe Mahon, Patrick O’Donnell and a person unknown.

He has pleaded not guilty to the seven counts.

He sits in the courtroom behind a curtain during each day of the trial.

The court sat for a brief hearing on Friday, and heard that the trial will resume next Wednesday morning, and is expected to last between two to three weeks.

[ Bloody Sunday: Judge rules evidence against soldier charged is admissableOpens in new window ]

There was some discussion around witnesses being subjected to cross-examination, with Mark Mulholland KC, for the defence, arguing that they were “quite exhaustively questioned at the lower court”.

“After the various years of media, Saville [inquiry] sittings, being at the hearings, what has occurred even in the last few years of these proceedings, there is a risk of innocent contamination,” he said.

Judge Lynch said he thinks cross-examination should take “more or less its normal form”.

The trial will sit again next Wednesday.