Six people died in road accidents yesterday. They included four young men from Belfast who were visiting Donegal. The four Belfast men in their 20s were killed in a two-car collision yesterday afternoon. They were travelling on the Fintown-Glenties road when their Vauxhall Nova car was in a head-on collision with a Volkswagen Passat.
Their car left the road after the impact and went over a 20 ft embankment, killing three of the occupants instantly. The fourth man was pronounced dead on arrival at Letterkenny General Hospital.
Two adults and five children from the area who were in the other car were taken to Letterkenny General Hospital. Three were last night in intensive care and the others were in a critical but stable condition.
A Garda spokesman said the accident was one of the worst in the county for years.
The scene was attended by four ambulances from Letterkenny and Dungloe while at Letterkenny General a major emergency situation was declared when news of the accident was received.
It is believed the men had travelled to Donegal earlier in the day and had planned to spend the weekend there. Their names had not been released last night.
Yesterday's toll brought the total number of fatal road deaths this year to 259.
The first of yesterday's fatal crashes occurred at 2 a.m at Old Park Road in Portmarnock, Co Dublin, when a BMW car went out of control and hit a tree.
The driver, Mr Andrew Crinnigan (22), from Lusk, Co Dublin, died in hospital from his injuries. His passenger, a man in his 20s, was said to be in a stable condition.
A passing motorist who saw the crash took the men from the car just before it went on fire.
In Delvin in Co Westmeath Mr Pat Mullen (31), Billistown, Delvin, was killed yesterday afternoon when his motorcycle collided with a lorry.
The road deaths toll this year is roughly comparable with the figure for last year, when 287 people had died by the end of August, 40 in the month of August.
The continuing high level of fatalities comes despite an increased Garda presence on the roads, with more speed checks as well as closer monitoring of the use of seat-belts and of the roadworthiness of cars.
It is now more than a year since the Taoiseach launched the Government's road safety strategy. At the end of July the Minister of State at the Department of the Environment, Mr Robert Molloy, announced plans to reduce road fatalities by 2002 by at least a fifth of their 1997 level.
Last year 458 people died on the road, a 3 per cent reduction on 1997.