Experts say inhaling helium can displace oxygen in the lungs with fatal consequences
A sister endured unimaginable heartbreak years ago when her brother, 5, died after playing with a simple party decoration. Karlton Noah Donaghey was only away from his mum’s gaze for a couple of minutes.
Sadly that was all it took for the boy to get hold of a helium balloon, with fatal consequences. Now his elder sister Kaitlin is raising awareness of the fatal consequences of breathing in helium products, which can all too quickly result in brain death.
Experts have warned that just one breath of the colourless gas could prove fatal, with oxygen displaced from the lungs, in turn depriving vital organs of oxygen. The Mirror reports how the hours leading up to what the coroner would later describe as “every parent’s nightmare” were completely normal.
It was June 23, 2022, a bright, hot day, and like many children, young Karlton was out enjoying the glorious sunshine. At a loose end, his sister Kaitlin, now 29, had taken her twin daughters, then both eight months old, over to the family home, to bask in her mother Lisa Donaghey’s “sun trap” of a garden.
The family nibbled contentedly on sandwiches and cherries, while young Karlton played in the pop-up swimming pool. Speaking with the Mirror, Kaitlin recalled how, as the baby of the family, Karlton harboured the usual sort of childhood jealousy towards his baby nieces, so used was he to being the centre of attention.
After getting out of the pool, he asked for a cuddle, but at that point, his mother and sister were busily feeding the twins, while seated on the rocking chair.
Kaitlin, from Gateshead, remembered: “My mam said, ‘Well, just let us feed one of the girls, and then I’ll give you some you time and me, and you can have a cuddle’.” It was then that Karlton headed to the toilet instead.
As they fed the babies, neither Kaitlin nor Lisa had any idea that they would never hear him speak again. As the minutes wore on, the family began to wonder what was taking Karlton so long.
But Kaitlin initially assumed the little lad was spending time washing his hands, something he “loved” to do. Kaitlin shared: “He took so much care.
“He loved doing his hair, his aftershave, and his teeth brushing. He would go over the top.
“He was the most hygienic five-year-old boy who really looked after himself and be handsome.”
Lisa decided to go on inside and check on him anyway, and in a matter of moments, the happy household descended into scenes of complete horror. Kaitlin recalled the frantic seconds: “I just heard the most awful screeching noises I’ve never experienced before.
“And automatically, I just assumed that someone had my mam at knife point in the passage or in the house. When I walked in, my mam had him in her arms, lifeless. He was already dead.”
In the small window of time it took for Kaitlin to follow on into the house, her mother walked in upon a scene no parent should have to witness. Karlton was lying motionless on the floor, the helium balloon he’d been given at a fair over his face.
As explained by Kaitlin, her brother had never really cared for sweets; he’d just wanted the balloon. Heartbreakingly, his mother had tried to make the innocent treat safer by cutting the string away, ensuring that it wouldn’t end up coiled around his neck.
Like many parents, she hadn’t been aware of the dangers of helium. The balloon had been “floating in the air”, but he had managed to climb for it, just as any “five-year-old adventurous child would”.
Upon finding her son, Lisa “immediately” pulled the balloon away from his face. The traumatic shock of the situation left her initially unable to comprehend what had happened to her beloved son, remembered as such a “happy, genuine little boy” by those who knew him.
Kaitlin told us: “She was in such a state of shock. I don’t think she’d put together what was actually happening.
“She’s just screeched, and she couldn’t get words out.
“She couldn’t talk, she couldn’t phone an ambulance. She just completely dropped to her knees.
“So I picked Karlton up off my mam. I’ve put him on the floor, and I’ve shook his shoulders, and I said, ‘Karlton’, and then I just looked at his face.
“His eyes were wide open. His colour had completely gone, and I knew at that minute he needed CPR.”
With her devastated mother in a terrible state, and her daughters too young to help, Kaitlin knew it was down to her alone to do what she could for her brother. Showing extraordinary strength, she endeavoured to “ring the ambulance, put it on speaker, start CPR”.
It only took four minutes for the ambulance to reach the house, but it proved to be a harrowing wait. Kaitlin recounted: “The ambulance was taking their time, and they were saying, ‘Is he breathing?’, and I just screamed at them, and I said, ‘He’s not breathing. He’s dead.
“I’m telling you, he’s dead. Like he’s already gone’.”
Hearing the agonised screeches, a neighbour, Aimee, who was trained in first aid, rushed in from outside to take over in CPR and didn’t stop until help arrived. Kaitlin’s gratitude towards her neighbour, whose kindness may well have given her a few more precious days with her brother, is evident.
Karlton was taken to the hospital in a gravely serious state, and it was down to Kaitlin to break the news to their grandmother, all while making sure to get her own children home. It was, she says, a “surreal” time, and, despite Karlton’s serious condition, they held out hope that such a “strong” boy would pull through.
Kaitlin had wanted to wait until her other brother got home to break the news, fearing for him driving after such a shock, but sadly, neighbours got there first, expressing sorrows over his loss before he learned what had happened. At this point, Karlton was still alive, but in a “dangerous situation”.
In the days that followed, Kaitlin remained hopeful, but it eventually became clear that her little brother, with his curious spirit, wouldn’t be coming back to them. The family spent six days with Karlton in the hospital, after which he suffered seizures, resulting in global brain damage.
At one point, the lad stopped breathing altogether while he was being transported for scans due to a machine failure. Kaitlin believes that, even in her brother’s severe condition, he could still hear them talking to him, noting how his heart monitor would “go through the roof” when certain words were said.
But then things took another devastating turn. It was towards the end of the fifth day that medics broke the news the family had been dreading.
Kaitlin disclosed: “They said, ‘You know, there’s really nothing we can do, and it will be kinder to turn the machines off’. Still, I presumed that he would still breathe.
“I just thought, ‘He’ll do it. He’s only five. He’s strong. He’s healthy’. Prior to all this, he was just such a strong, willing little boy. I thought he would fight it.
“But then we decided to turn the machines off.”
Reflecting on her mother’s final moments with Karlton, while the rest of them waited in the family room, Kaitlin said: “She spoke to him, she made him promises. She made sure to clean his hair, and brush his teeth, and wipe his face, and change him into fresh PJs and socks with his aftershave on, and all his teddies.
“She turned his machine off, and he just didn’t pull through.” She added: “I know that my mam promised him, ‘If you need to go now, I’ll let you go.
“You go to sleep now, and don’t worry about mam. I promise I’ll be strong’. […] And she’s kept that promise.
“She’s been strong. Had she not, I don’t know what situation she would be in now.”
Nearly four years on, and Karlton’s bereaved family are still working their way through “a massive range of emotions”. Kaitlin said, “One minute you can be having a good day, and then you’d feel guilty for even smiling because then you’re missing them.”
For Kaitlin, her brother’s death still feels as though it was “just yesterday”, and she doesn’t believe any family members have really adjusted to the loss. She still thinks about his voice “all the time”, and sometimes thinks she can still hear him shouting out, “sister!”
She also feels his presence in one of her daughters, who shares Karlton’s fascination with all things dinosaurs, despite being too young to remember how her late uncle could remember and pronounce all the different names perfectly.
She said: “I think small things, a song, a sound, a smell, everything jogs your memory back to him. I was 18 when my mam had him, it was the best thing ever.
“I was old enough to look after him. I could do my own thing with him. He was a part of me, but also my brother.”
Going forward, Kaitlin hopes to highlight just how dangerous the popular party treat, so often seen as a harmless bit of fun, actually is. She told the Mirror: “It’s too large of a risk to take, you’re dicing with death.
“You might make it and just have a silly voice, but you don’t know which way it’s going to turn out.”
Kaitlin has heard of two other children who’ve died after inhaling helium since Karlton’s passing, and is determined that no more lives be lost. And while she has become all too aware of the risks in the most terrible way imaginable, there are still far too many who don’t understand just how quickly and irreversibly the effects can take hold, both for children and adults.
On April 2, 2021, eight-year-old Luke Ramone Harper, from Dublin, was declared dead at Temple Street Children’s Hospital, the day after he placed a partially deflated helium balloon over his face. As reported by Metro, Luke’s heartbroken parents brought him out into the fresh air and attempted chest compressions, but to no avail.
The youngster suffered a cardiac arrest after being rushed to the hospital, with coroner Cróna Gallagher returning a verdict of accidental death. Then, on April 27, 2024, while loved ones were celebrating his eighth birthday at his Merseyside home, Joshua Dunbar was discovered unconscious in his bedroom, beside a helium balloon shaped like a figure of eight.
Although Joshua was rushed to the hospital, he sadly didn’t survive, with a post-mortem confirming his death as “consistent with asphyxia involving a helium balloon”. During the inquest, coroner Andre Rebello emphasised that, while helium is not poisonous, “the breathing of helium prevented oxygen getting into his body, and without oxygen, within minutes, life is not achievable.”
For Kaitlin, reading about such cases is agony. She remarked, “To find that this is continuing to happen after trying to raise awareness is absolutely gut-wrenching; it hurts so much to hear that another life has been lost due to inhalation of helium.
“I feel a huge responsibility to make everyone aware, just in case I can possibly save a life, I wish I could scream it from the rooftops and let the whole world hear me.
“I won’t ever be able to hear my brother’s voice or feel his touch again. Life is now filled with pain and will never be the same.
“I don’t want any other family to feel this way.”
Kaitlin is now greatly concerned by a current trend of people sucking gas out of nitrous oxide cans, and has urged them to think of their families at home before doing something “so so deadly” for a “two-second buzz”. She’s also concerned about reports of this being used as a method of suicide.
Describing one such instance, she explained: “I’m in touch with another lady. Her brother was only 25, and he just bought it and put a bag over his head and just kept breathing, and he didn’t know he was dying.
“Your body thinks you’re breathing because you’re not struggling for breath, but you’re actually just breathing in helium, and that displaces oxygen.
“So before you know it, a couple of seconds, and you’ve got no oxygen in your brain, so you die without knowing. You generally don’t know until you’ve entered cardiac arrest.”
Having learned such awful facts the hard way, she’s “tired” of people thinking this sort of thing “won’t happen to them”, when really, what happened to Karlton could have happened to any family. Kaitlin told us: “Everyone questions, why has your son got hold of helium and why was he unattended?
“But in reality, five-year-olds can go to the toilet unattended.”
At the time of the coroner’s report, Kaitlin was hopeful that a course would be introduced for anyone working with helium and that warning signs would be displayed alongside the balloons. In their report, coroner James Thompson outlined matters of concern in a letter addressed to The Office for Product Safety and Standards (OPSS), namely, that “the balloon which caused the death are freely available to purchase without restriction, particularly at locations of places of entertainment for children”, “Parents and those responsible for supervision of children are not fully aware of the risks posed to young children of helium filled balloons”, “the balloon in question displayed no warning as to the potential risk to young children”
Four years on, though, and Kaitlin says she’s yet to see a single label, and feels that much more needs to be done. Kaitlin continued: “Regardless of how safe you want to be about it, the only way to ensure your child doesn’t inhale helium is to just not buy it.
“No parent can be with their child 24/7. It’s impossible. It really is impossible.
“You can just go to the toilet upstairs, and your child can be doing something else downstairs. To take that risk away, just don’t buy them.
“You can get the balloon stacks that are filled with air and are spectacular-looking. It doesn’t have to be helium.”
The Mirror has reached out to the British Standards Institution, the Office for Product Safety and Standards (OPSS), the British Toy and Hobby Association and the British Retail Consortium for comment.
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