By James Bowler

Friends look to honour P.A. man who died in Australia

Jun 17, 2015 | 6:32 AM

A Prince Albert man is hoping to create a special memorial to pay his respects to a friend who recently died.

Adam Halyk started a GoFundMe campaign to help raise money to build a beach volleyball court in the name of his friend Nigel Weir. 

“Nigel got adopted into my family, he was best friends with my younger brother Evan, instead of him driving out to Tweedsmuir every night after [volleyball and basketball] practice, he would just stay at our house,” said Halyk. “He went on quite a few family trips with us.”

Halyk said that he and Weir worked together after Weir graduated from high school, and also were roomates in university for two years as well before Weir left for Australia for his final year of school.

On June 5, Weir fell to his death from a balcony at a social gathering in Brisbane, Australia.

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Halyk said that Weir’s love for volleyball inspired him to pull together this campaign to keep his memory alive in Prince Albert.

“When we found out that he had died, it was a hard hit for everybody, and we knew that he was very involved in the beach volleyball [in Australia], he was the captain of the beach volleyball club in Queensland,” said Halyk. “One of the organizers that has been pushing for a while to get beach volleyball courts in Prince Albert kind of mentioned to me that that ‘we’re trying to get this done’.”

The original plan from the committee before Halyk became involved, was to build a beach volleyball court outside of the Alfred Jenkins Field House.

“I thought, ‘you know, what better way to get Nigel’s legacy memorial put on something that he loved so much’.”

Halyk started the campaign on GoFundMe, looking to raise $60,000 for the beach volleyball court. The campaign has been running for five days and has already raised more than $5,000.

Halyk said he and the committee have a meeting scheduled with the City to discuss the initial planning stages for this new beach volleyball court. The meeting is set to take place on June 24, and from there, they are looking to figure out where it will be and how much funding would be needed.

“From my interpretation is that it’s going to be part of the Alfred Jenkins facility,” Halyk said.

Halyk said that if they exceed their fundraising goal, they’re considering putting the excess money into a scholarship in Weir’s name as well.

“There’s a few other committees that are putting forth money for this [beach volleyball] project,” said Halyk. “It’s been underway for the past few years, we’re just trying to help out as much as we can with it.”

If you’re interested in offering a donation towards this memorial campaign, click here. 

jbowler@panow.com

On Twitter: @journalistjim