ANIMAL lover and strict vegetarian Dominic Arnold’s memory lives on through his family’s work to rescue orphaned orang-utans in Borneo.
His mother and step-father Erica and Damien Murphy decided to give funeral donations to the orang-utan conservation projects at Chester Zoo, because they knew their son would have approved.
The couple and their daughter Rebecca,19, visited the animals in the wild in Borneo last August and hope to raise further funds for the foundation featured on the BBC’s Orangutan Diary series.
Erica said: “Dom had every David Attenborough DVD, he loved animals, he was always having a go at us for eating meat.
Damien added: “There has to be something good to come out of this. Deforestation is destroying the orang-utan’s habitat and leaving the babies orphaned. If we can save some of them, it will be something good.”
The couple say they will remember Dominic as an entertainer who taught himself to juggle, unicycle and played the drums.
Erica said: “On holiday he would spend his time juggling for all the other little children – they would follow him along the beach like the pied piper.
“We would be sitting out in the garden and he would come out and just start entertaining us.
“He loved skiing with his father, kite surfing and scuba diving. His Christmas present last year was to dive with Wilma the sand shark at the Blue Planet Aquarium, but of course he never got to do it.”
The couple say they are grateful to everybody who helped them through the last year, and for the tributes to Dominic and Tristan mounted across Chester.
Erica wears orange clothing every day in memory of Dominic and to mark the work they are doing for the orang-utans.
Orange flowers have also been planted at the crash site and the family wore orange ribbons every day to the court trial.
