GARDAÍ HAVE renewed their appeal for information on a car crash which claimed the lives of two young people, the first victims on the Republic’s roads of 2011.
Driver Patrick Harper (22) and his friend Susan Larrigan (17) were the only people in a car which went out of control and crashed into a wooden pole on the M1 motorway, killing both of them.
The friends were both from Dundalk, Co Louth. Postmortems were carried out in the Louth County Hospital yesterday afternoon.
A Garda spokesman said they were trying to piece together where the two had been before they got into the car early on New Year’s Day.
The crash happened at 4.30am on the southbound lane of the motorway between junctions 15 and 16. Preliminary investigations have led gardaí to believe the car joined the motorway at the Dundalk south slip road. There are reports that for a short time it travelled on the hard shoulder before moving out into the motorway.
A short distance south of Dundalk, it is believed to have overtaken another car. As their car, a BMW, was moving back into its lane after completing overtaking, it appears the vehicles may have tipped each other before the BMW went out of control.
It veered to the left-hand side of the road and crossed over the hard shoulder before going into a field alongside the motorway.
A wooden pole went through the driver’s door and the young man and the teenager sustained fatal injuries.
It is believed they would have died instantly.
Garda spoke yesterday of the anguish of parents and relatives of the young people.
Messages of condolence were being posted on to the Facebook page of Ms Larrigan’s mother, Valerie, yesterday.
Ms Larrigan had an address in the Castle Ross estate in Dundalk while Mr Harper was living in the Naughtons Close area of the town.
The investigation is being led by gardaí from Ardee.
A Garda spokesman asked yesterday that anyone who witnessed the crash or who was travelling on that stretch of motorway at the time to contact them either on 041-687 1130 or the Garda confidential line at 1800-666 111.
As part of the postmortem process, blood samples will be taken from both and sent for toxicology testing.
Last year was the safest year on record on the roads with 212 fatalities, down 26 on 2009 when 238 people died on the roads.
That year was also a record low, coming after the introduction of compulsory breathtesting.
The number of people being killed on the roads now is almost half what it was in 2005, when there was nearly 400 fatalities.