Remains leave St Joseph's Church, Galliagh, Derry, after requiem Mass for Mr Michael Corcoran (19), Mr Martin Corcoran (27) and Mr John Stokes (25) who were killed in a collision on the Buncrana road on Monday morning. Photograph: Trevor McBride.
There was uncontrollable grief at the funerals in Derry yesterday of the three members of the settled Travelling community, killed when their Vauxhall Astra car crashed head-on with a minibus near the Co Donegal village of Burnfoot early last Monday morning.
Travelling families from all over Ireland were among the hundreds of mourners who attended requiem Mass for Mr John Stokes (25), a father of one, and his two friends, brothers Mr Martin Corcoran (27), a married man with four children, and Mr Michael Corcoran (19), who had been married just four weeks ago.
After requiem Mass, the three victims, all of them from Derry's Galliagh estate, were buried in Park cemetery, Co Derry.
Father Bryan McCanny of St Joseph's Parish in Galliagh told mourners that his parishioners shared in the grief of the bereaved families. He said the horrific circumstances of the tragedy had left three young women widowed, five children fatherless and an unborn child who would never see his or her father.
"The people are totally devastated by this disaster. It was the first time in this parish that we have had three bodies in the church side by side. We know the families and this has affected us very deeply. The original people of Israel, the Jewish people, were travelling people, too, a nomadic people, and that's how they experienced God and from that experience they were able to make sense out of deep tragedies in their own lives.
"The families are absolutely devastated. A morbid silence has descended on the families and they are inconsolable, particularly the women who have lost three fathers, three husbands; parents who have lost their sons, so it is obviously very depressing.
"Five children have been bereaved of their fathers. It is also against the nature of things for parents to be burying their sons, their children.
"There are still six people injured in hospital, and our prayers and our thoughts are with them at this time", said Father McCanny.