Gardai received reports of a car travelling at high speed without any lights shortly before Wednesday night's road accident near Arklow, Co Wicklow, in which four people were killed.
The accident happened at around 10.30 p.m. at Scratnagh Crossroads, four miles north of Arklow, when two cars were involved in a head-on collision.
One of the dead was the former Democratic Left senator and Wexford councillor, Mr Michael Enright, who had been travelling alone in his car to his Wexford home from a meeting in Dublin. Mr Enright was cut from the wreckage of his car but died shortly afterwards.
The other three victims were killed instantly when their car overturned on impact with Mr Enright's vehicle and burst into flames. They were: Mr Peter Martin (24), from Arklow; Mr JohnPaul Redmond (17), from Rathnew, and his first cousin Mr Joseph Redmond (15), from Tinahely. It is not certain which of the three occupants was driving the car.
A Garda spokesman said they could not yet confirm if the speeding car spotted earlier was involved in the crash. Supt Pat Flynn, from Arklow Garda station, said a phone call to the station at around 10.40 p.m. reported a car travelling north from Arklow at excessive speed without any lights. He said gardai in Arklow and Wicklow went in search of this car, but a phone call three minutes later reported the accident at Scratnagh. Supt Flynn said the first caller mentioned a speed of 100 m.p.h.
Gardai at Arklow (tel 040232304) are asking anyone with information about the accident to contact them.
These four deaths bring the number of people killed in road accidents in the Republic since Saturday to 20. The toll this year now stands at 357, a similar figure to the first 10 months of 1996.
The latest spate of road fatalities comes only one week after the National Safety Council introduced a new anti-speeding campaign. A spokesman for the council, Mr Gavin Freeman, said there was no doubt that speed was the most frequently cited factor in road accidents involving injuries and fatalities.
He said council research identified male drivers in the 25 to 34year age group as being in more accidents involving injuries and fatalities than any other group. As a result, this was the group targeted in the council's new advertising campaign, which likened the speeding driver to a serial killer.
Mr Freeman said the research into "at-risk" drivers revealed that they never saw speed as the culpable factor in road accidents and were confident about their ability to handle speed.