WESTLIFE singer Nicky Byrne has paid a touching tribute to his late father on the 13th anniversary of his death.
Nicky Byrne Snr. died at the age of 60 back in 2009 after a sudden heart attack.
Remembering his dad, the former Dancing With The Stars host shared a throwback photo of his dad and wrote: “13 years today since we lost this legend.”
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“Miss ya dad ‘Do the Biz’ wherever you are .”
Nicky shared a video of his dad performing with the Westlife dads.
He wrote: “My Dad… 13 years gone today. He was in his element this night with all the Westlife dads! A cherished memory.”
He captioned the post: “Always brings a smile to my face. As a singer all his life with ‘Nikki & Studz’. He Bloody loved this moment.”
Back in 2020, Nicky opened up about his father’s death on Brian Dowling’s podcast Death Becomes Him.
“It was November 2009. I was flying out that day to do a radio tour with Westlife.
“My mam phoned me at 11am and said, ‘I can’t get your dad on the phone’ and she said, ‘have you spoken to him?’ And I said, ‘No I haven’t actually.'”
Nicky said he tried to call his dad several times, but there was no answer.
“So I phoned my mam, and I’m getting on the plane now, and I said, ‘Mam did you get dad?’ And she said no. At that point I thought, ‘something’s not right here.'”
The father-of-three said he then called his dad’s work colleague Neil and asked him to check on him.
He said: “(Neil) said ‘I’m just opening the door to his office now’ and then the phone went dead. At that point I thought he’s either dead on the floor or the phone, in some weird wrong timing, cut off.”
After calling him back, Nicky was told that his dad was on the floor, and Neil went to get help.
Nicky managed to get off the plane and ran through Dublin Airport to meet his wife Georgina.
“I phoned St James’ hospital, tears in my eyes and I said, ‘You’ve admitted somebody there, Nicholas Byrne, and I’m just seeing how he is.'”
“And they said, ‘And who are you?’ I remember breaking down when I said, ‘I’m his son.'”
“And they said, ‘You need to come into the hospital, you don’t need to rush but you need to come into the hospital’ so I knew he was gone,” Nicky explained.
Nicky previously admitted life hasn’t been the same ever since.
“I lost my dad in 2009 and Westlife was still going. And when Westlife split in 2012 I did Strictly, Dad never saw it, I did Eurovision, Dad never saw it, my radio show on 2FM, plenty of things.”
“I had another child, dad never saw it and my two kids he did meet before he passed away grew up, had communions, formed their own hobbies, all of those things.”
“And I think the emotion is always there. Life changes forever, it gets slightly easier to deal with it. But life is never the same.”
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