Silence and shock in Clonmel: 'Everyone is numb'

By mid-afternoon, about 30 bouquets of flowers had been laid, leaning against the wall of a private house.

In the middle, were four candles which a pair of women had left earlier in the day.

The groups moved almost in silence, their shock was so great. 

They barely exchanged a word and none of them could bring themselves to look past the Garda vans parked at the entrance to Mountain Road.

Had they, they would have seen what was left of the wreckage - a smashed car resting on its roof at a slight bend at Hillview, off the Mountain Road, about 500 metres from the entrance by the Raheen Road roundabout.

Instead, they filed past the Garda vans and made for the wall of flowers.

All who came stood in silence, with their heads bowed and hands clasped in front of them, sharing a moment of silent prayer and reflection for their deceased friends, and in some cases, family.

One young man and woman walked side by side to the wall, pausing to lay down their own bouquet of flowers.

All of a sudden, as they stood and stared, the young man’s head jerked forward, tears streaming from his eyes.

The young woman by his side put a comforting arm around his shoulder. Moments later they both turned away, their eyes red with tears, both their faces in a daze as they walked away apart and utterly lost in their own devastation.

One woman who spoke to the Irish Examiner said the whole community was "numb with shock".

Two of the girls were related to a very close friend of hers.

She knew them too, and was clearly stunned by what had happened.

“I’m not on Facebook because that is where you get all the bad news, right,” she said.

“But at around 9pm, my friend called me and told me what had happened.

“I know this sounds like an awful cliché but words really can’t express how any of us feel."

Another woman said: “My heart goes out to that poor family on Mountain Road.

“They don’t live too far from the site of the crash.” 

Deputy Mayor of Clonmel Cllr Michael Murphy spoke for many in the town when he described the community as being “under a cloud of shock”.

He said people were finding it very hard to take the news in and even make sense of it.

“It’s very hard to digest this kind of thing, especially as a parent of a Leaving Cert student myself,” he said.

“My own son knew two of the girls very well and everyone is just blindsided by the shock and sadness of it all.” He added: “What should have been a day of celebration turned very quickly as news broke.

“My son was on the bus when he found out, on his way to Carlow in a different bus that then turned round and went back to Clonmel.” 

There was a sound so ordinary that one couple living near the crash site hardly batted an eyelid when they heard it.

“We heard two loud bangs, like the sound of a trailer hitting a ramp or a pothole,” they said.

“It was pouring with rain at the time and we were indoors, but it was loud enough for us to hear.

“About ten minutes later, we ventured out but a Garda told us to stay indoors and not go near the junction at the end of our road.

“She warned us: ‘it’s just horrendous down there’.” 

By 5pm, the vans at the end of Mountain Road had been removed and the spot where the car turned over onto its roof had been cleared of all debris.

All that remained of the crash, at a stone-walled corner near the entrance to Hillview Sports Club, and across the road from the entrance to Old Spa Road were more flowers and a battered telegraph pole, its base cracked. 

Just about every car passing the spot slowed to a stop before resuming its journey.

Garda Superintendent Kieran Ruane, who addressed media this afternoon, said there would be "difficult days ahead" for the grieving town. 

Referring to his own colleagues and the first responders who attended the scene, he said "we are the community.

"We’ve lost four young people in our community, and we will be very much there for our community in the coming days."