Garda observers are optimistic that some calm weather forecast for up to noon today will enable Garda and Naval Service divers to make progress in the search for two men feared killed on Monday when their vehicle plunged off cliffs near Doolin.
The men - named locally as Joe O'Callaghan (34) from Tulla, Co Clare, and Michael Doran (31), from Broadford, Co Clare - are believed to have been in the green Suzuki Vitara with Martin Griffin (24), whose body was found on the beach near Doolin on Tuesday.
The three, who were working on the construction of the East Clare Holiday Village in Bodyke, arrived in Doolin on Sunday for the bank holiday and were last seen outside a local pub at 1.30am on Monday.
A walker has confirmed to gardaí that he sighted a similar vehicle above Doonagore Bay at 9.30am on Monday, but it had gone by the time he returned some 40 minutes later.
As northwesterly squalls continued to batter the Clare coast yesterday, Irish Coast Guard teams from the 20-member Doolin unit assisted by members of the Kilkee unit were out walking the shoreline from 7am, extending the search up to 20 km on either side of Doolin.
They were later joined by four brothers of Joe O'Callaghan and up to 30 family members, friends, workmates and local people who had taken time off to help.
In the afternoon, a Coast Guard helicopter flew low over Doonagore Bay while the RNLI lifeboat from the Aran Islands carrying sonar equipment trawled the area.
"Unfortunately it didn't come across any large objects", said Mattie Shannon, area Coast Guard officer, adding that turbulence near the cliff edge would have hampered sonar capability.
Fears that debris has been widely scattered by wind and wave direction were confirmed when a tyre believed to belong to a Suzuki Vitara was recovered from the sea some four miles from where the bonnet was found on Wednesday close to the crash site.
Searchers on the shoreline also recovered some plastic car panelling, pieces of clothing and a shoe, said to match a shoe recovered the previous day.
While the logistics of organising the sheer numbers of untrained volunteers seemed to hinder as much as help yesterday's search, Coast Guard officers noted that next Tuesday - the ninth day after the accident - is when additional help would be welcome.
The bodies of drowning victims tend to resurface between the seventh and ninth day.
Meanwhile, the funeral of Mr Griffin takes place this morning at 11am in Ennis cathedral.