Crash victims' funeral hear pleas to cut road deaths

The three friends from Buncrana, along with David Steele, 23, from Quigley’s Point and 21-year-old Charlene O’Connor, from Buncrana, were all killed in the car accident at Quigley’s Point near Muff early on Saturday morning.

Today at the Mass for Darren and Gavin, Father Con McLaughlin said the words ‘mourning and weeping in this valley of tears’ had flashed through his mind while he stood at the scene of the crash.

In his homily, Fr McLaughlin said: “Another horrific road accident, another tragedy for Buncrana, and the revival in people’s minds of the tragedies that have already taken place in this area and the associated ongoing grief in the bereaved, it’s all so evident.”

Since coming to Buncrana, he had witnessed too many young people’s bodies lifted from car wrecks and tried to offer words of consolation to grieving families, he said.

“For Brendan and Annette Duffy and their children, and for Patrick and Pauline Quinn and their children at this moment they, as other parents and families, don’t want to hear the words eternal rest – they just want their children now starting out in life to be with them again,” he said.

“A community stunned by it all asks why, so this morning again could I appeal to young people to just try to be more aware and to understand the dangers which often seem hidden to them but are very real nonetheless, so we do not have to witness the tragic loss of life and the associated grief that is so enduring in the hearts of bereaved families and friends,” he said.

Speaking after the Funeral Mass of Rachelle Peoples, Fr Eddie McGuinness said hundreds of people had turned up to the services despite heavy rain.

“It was very difficult circumstances, but the family seem surprisingly strong.

“There was a massive turnout of young people, who have been very, very supportive.

“For many of them it’s their first experience of death, but they were all there,” he said.

Fr McGuinness, who officiated at Rachelle’s funeral, said he had also asked the young people in the congregation to think about why so many accidents were happening.

“I asked them to start debating it among themselves what the causes generally are, to make them aware.

“There’s a lot more education about driving, but it doesn’t seem to be working.”

He said the community was still in shock after the tragic accident in the early hours of Saturday morning.

“I noticed on Sunday morning, the strange thing was people weren’t talking about it – they were too shocked, too numbed, and there was an eerie quietness,” he said.

Mayor of Buncrana Padraig MacLochlinn said communities in Inishowen and across Donegal had been shocked by the deaths and that something would have to be done to tackle the ongoing tragedy of young fatalities on the roads.

“After the funerals we’re going to have to sit down with the community in Donegal and see what responses we’re going to take, and what initiatives we need to undertake to address this ongoing tragedy, because we can’t continue to bury our young people without doing something to tame the circumstances that are there,” he said.

The funeral of David Steele was being held this afternoon, while Charlene O’Connor is to be buried following a Mass tomorrow morning.