Ciara grew up in London but her grandparents hail from Rathmullan (Donegal), and Tourmakeady (Mayo). She moved to Dublin at age 16 to train with Swim Ireland’s elite diving squad for three years before joining Ohio State University in 2020. At Ohio she has won a Big 10 title, reached NCAA finals, obtained a degree in health sciences, and is currently doing her Masters. She won her first senior Irish title at 17, and debuted for Ireland at the 2019 Junior European championships in Kazan, Russia. Ciara narrowly missed qualifying for Tokyo 2020; she finished 23rd in the World Diving Cup where the top 18 qualified. Since then she made her World Championships debut for Ireland in 2022, finished sixth at the 2023 European Games in a PB of 280.20 points, and was also a finalist at the 2020 Europeans where she finished ninth.