She ended up in a Hizbul-Islam displacement camp, and in pursuit of competing at the 2012 Summer Olympics, she crossed the border to Ethiopia looking for a safe place to train.

Omar was in the eighth grade at the time, and she dropped out of school in response to look after her siblings while her mother sold produce to provide for the family.

[4] Because of a lack of funding, Omar competed in equipment donated by the Sudanese team,[3] lining up in a heat which included eventual gold medallist Veronica Campbell-Brown from Jamaica.

By December 2009, she and her family were living in a displacement camp organised by the Islamic insurgent group Hizbul-Islam, located about 20 kilometres (12 mi) outside Mogadishu.

[3] In 2011, Omar fled the fighting of the civil war and moved to Addis Abeba, leaving her family behind, partly to pursue her dream of competing at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, United Kingdom.

Now a middle-distance athlete, she was due to begin training with former Olympian Eshetu Tura, who was recommended to her by the prominent Qatar-based Somali track coach Jama Aden and the Olympic medalist Mohamed Suleiman.

Krug later reported that in a desire to find a coach, Omar travelled north towards Europe, crossing the Sudans and entering Libya.

Both Omar's family and Krug attempted to talk her out of it, and to remain in Ethiopia where the Somali Olympic Committee were hoping to set up a training camp.

[10] The Huffington Post reported that Qadijo Aden Dahir, the Deputy Chairman for Somalia's athletics federation, had confirmed that Omar had drowned off the Libyan seaboard while trying to reach Italy from her home in Ethiopia.

[11] Exact details of her death eventually came to light; she boarded a packed boat with 70 other people in an attempt to cross the Mediterranean Sea and reach Italy.

In the chaos that ensued as people attempting to grab the ropes, Omar was knocked into the sea, where witnesses saw her treading water for a while, but eventually drowned.