New traffic gardaí for road death blackspot
A Garda Traffic Corps unit is to be established in Donegal in a bid to halt a spate of road deaths that has ravaged the county.
The new posting, comprising of one sergeant and four gardaí, will be based at Burnfoot Garda Station from 7am tomorrow morning.
The unit will complete a three-month pilot project in the Donegal Division, concentrating their activities in the Inishowen Peninsula, an area which has seen 17 young people lose their lives in the last 18 months.
A garda spokeswoman said: “This Unit has been established as part of An Garda Siochana’s commitment to Road Safety and will assist local Gardai in their efforts to reduce and prevent road fatalities in that area.”
The move comes after the Government was urged to draw up a separate road safety strategy for Donegal after crashes in the county claimed six young lives in one weekend earlier this month.
Three men and two women in their early 20s were killed in a head-on collision near Quigley’s Point, Muff in the early hours of Saturday, October 8.
A male passenger in his 20s died about five miles away the following morning when the car in which he was travelling struck a ditch on the Burnfoot Road.
Three teenagers were also killed in Buncrana in July 2004 when their car struck a bridge and plunged into a field.
Mayor of Buncrana Cllr Padraig MacLochlainn claimed a fresh safety initiative was needed after 17 young people were killed on Inishowen’s roads in the last year and a half.
