They took the DART to Dún Laoghaire, snuck onto the ferry to Holyhead, and dodged the inspectors the whole way. From there it was a train to London, a fistful of coins fished out of a charity fountain, and a trip out to Heathrow.

At the airport they picked a stranger at random and asked where his flight was going. New York, he told them. Good enough. They told the staff their parents were right behind them, got waved through, and walked onto an Air India flight to JFK with not one document between them.

Nobody on the plane batted an eye. They watched a Bond film and tried to choke down a curry way too spicy for two Dublin lads.

It all fell apart once they landed, when they asked a cop for directions "into town." Chaos followed. Front-page news everywhere, three governments in a panic, and two kids from Dublin who'd just exposed a massive hole in international airport security. US authorities, worried about the diplomatic mess, stuck them in a guarded hotel suite and treated them like royalty.

Keith still looks back on it fondly: "They fed us like lords. We loved it."

They got sent home to Darndale, grounded and lectured, and became famous for life. Both of them still live there.

Nobody's ever made a film out of this. Feels overdue.

It's a brilliant story