A devastated mum has told how her son died from a silent killer whilst travelling South America after he stayed in accommodation that didn't have a £20 gadget. Cathy Foley lost her son Hudson after he died suddenly due to a carbon monoxide leak in Ecuador last year.
Cathy, 62, took her other children Jordan and Natasha on a once-in-a-lifetime family trip to the continent this summer, as they retraced Hudson's steps who was bag packing across the continent. Hudson had jetted off to Ecuador to see South America and visit the breath taking Amazon before tragedy struck.
The 24-year-old was found passed away in the bathroom of his homestay accommodation, The Mirror reports. For Cathy, 62, hearing her son, who was supposed to be living his dream backpacking around South America, was gone was horrific.
She says: “I was in absolute disbelief. I still am. I have my cup of coffee in the morning by his grave and I still drive in and go, ‘Oh my God, this can’t be real’. Hudson was very upbeat, very positive and very kind. He absolutely loved life."
Carbon monoxide is both colourless and odourless and can kill humans within minutes if it leaks from a fuel-burning appliance into a poorly ventilated room. It poisons some 30,000 people around the world each year, according to a 2023 study in The Lancet.
Deaths like Hudson’s can be prevented via carbon monoxide detectors – which cost just £20. But many homes in places like Ecuador don’t have detectors and there is little education on the dangers.
Hudson made one last phone call to his mum just hours before he died, whilst staying in the capital, Quito. On the 40 minute chat he chatted away happily and shared tales of his travel plans to go on to Colombia.
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Cathy recalls: “He was going to meet a girl he was very fond of later that day, and he was telling me he’d had a haircut and a shave especially for the occasion.”
Four hours later Cathy’s phone rang again from the tour operator – and a stranger told her Hudson was dead. She says: “They said, ‘We’re really sorry to tell you but your son has been found passed away in the bathroom of where he was staying’. We were in complete shock.”
At first it was a mystery why Hudson, a healthy young man who did not drink or do drugs, had died of acute pulmonary oedema – when too much fluid accumulates in the lungs, affecting breathing. Cathy, who flew out to Ecuador the day after her son’s death, fought for a full postmortem report. When toxicology results came back in October, they showed high levels of carbon monoxide in Hudson’s blood.
Cathy, a nutritionist from Camberley, Surrey, says: “Ecuador didn’t even have one carbon monoxide expert in the entire country. I had to find my own.” Despite her shock and grief, the mum does not blame the family Hudson was staying with, nor the tour provider who introduced him to the homestay.
She says: “I met the family. They are the most kind, caring, considerate people, which makes it even more horrendous when you think that’s where he passed away.” Hudson was an intrepid adventurer, who had already travelled around Australia and had once gone all the way to Ukraine to watch his beloved Chelsea play.
And while Hudson was repatriated and laid to rest in Surrey, his mum believes Ecuador is where she feels closest to him. She says: “Hudson loved Quito so much. He was quite a spiritual young man, especially for somebody so young. So I kind of feel that his spirit is in Quito.” When she travelled there earlier this year with Natasha, 30, and Jordan, 29, they completed some of Hudson’s plans in his memory.
Cathy says: “We went on a bit of a pilgrimage because Hudson had booked to go to the Amazon, but obviously didn’t get to do his trip. He would have loved it. So we did it for him.” The trio also retraced his steps on the Inca Trail, stopping in the spots where Hudson had posed for pictures he sent to the family’s WhatsApp group.
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His mum adds: “Natasha brought pictures along of Hudson at various points, so our guide helped us find those positions. And when we found them he took a photograph of us and we held Hudson’s photograph up, too, so that we could experience the same thing. It was very emotional. “Hudson was very upbeat, very positive and very kind. He absolutely loved life. He always had the most amazing smile on his face and was the sort of person that radiated positivity and warmth.
“He loved dancing and would go out all night without any alcohol. Someone once said, which was true, that Hudson was high on life. When he passed away, I was inundated with messages from young travellers he’d come into contact with saying nice things about him.” Hudson had worked for a virtual golf company before going travelling. Cathy adds: “He’d achieved a lot by 24, but he had so much more to give. We miss him so much.”
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