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Family’s miracle escape A HOUSEHOLDER said it was a
miracle that he, his family and seven occupants of a coach weren’t
killed when the 14-tonne vehicle careered off a main road and crashed
through a wall into his garden.
John O’Brien left his house to go to work just 60 seconds before
the Aircoach bus skidded off the main Dublin-Cork road, hit a crash barrier
and flew into the air before landing in his garden.
The 35-year-old construction worker said his pregnant wife Ailish and
their 18-month old son Jack had left the house a few minutes before the
accident.
“If any of us had been pulling out of the driveway at the time we’d
have been blown away,” said Mr O’Brien.
“When I arrived back at the scene and saw what had happened I thought
people had been killed. It was a miracle that nobody was.”
The accident happened at Brackbawn in Kilbehenny a few miles north of
Mitchelstown in Co. Cork.
Mr O’Brien said when he arrived the passengers had clambered out
but the bus driver was still inside the vehicle.
“He was in shock, as were the others,” he said. “The
emergency services got him out and put blankets around him.”
A fleet of seven ambulances ferried the injured to hospitals in Cork.
Most of the passengers were suffering from shock and minor cuts and bruises.
Fire officer Michael Carolan said: “It was a miracle that nobody
was killed.”
The accident happened on a stretch of road that has witnessed a number
of fatal crashes in the past 20 years. |
