A woman from Co Mayo has been hospitalized after being shot in Millner, a suburb of Darwin in the Northern Territory of Australia, on Tuesday evening, October 3.
The woman has been named locally as Eileen Gibbons, from Castlebar in Co Mayo, according to the Irish Times. She is reportedly a social worker who immigrated to Australia about seven years ago.
Australia’s Northern Territory Police said on Wednesday that around 6:30 pm on Tuesday, October 3, they received reports of an injured woman and man at a property in Millner.
The 38-year-old woman was conveyed to Royal Darwin Hospital in a critical condition, suffering from a gunshot wound to the abdomen.
The 35-year-old man was declared deceased at the scene and a firearm was seized close to his person.
Detectives from Major Crime are investigating and believe both the man and woman in Millner were known to one another.
9News in Australia reports that the man's mother and two brothers were in the home at the time of the shooting.
"It's just all really tragic because they've got a one-year-old baby as well," Kim Leonard-Bond, a neighbor, told 9News. "Now she has no dad."
Neighbors said the couple had split up in recent months and that the woman had not been living at the address at the time of the shooting, but had returned to collect her things.
"It's obviously distressing for family members and friends of the persons involved and obviously a confronting scene for first responders," Detective Senior Sergeant Paul Morrissey said afterward.
In Mayo, local Fianna Fáil Councillor Martin McLoughlin told Western People that the woman has had a successful operation and is on the road to recovery.
“You are always hoping an operation like that will be successful but the indications are that she will make a recovery and we are all hoping that will be the case,” Cllr McLoughlin said.
“It was devastating news and all we can do at this stage is wish her well and I hope that she makes a full recovery,” he said.
Ireland's Department of Foreign Affairs is reportedly providing consular assistance to the family, some of whom are set to travel to Australia to be by the woman's bedside as she recovers.
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