Four Polish men who died in a car crash on Good Friday in Cork were yesterday laid to rest in their home town of Pisz in the north of the country.
Sylwester Szczyrow (25), Andrzej Wojciechowski (27), Radoslaw Nowak (23) and Rafal Gorski (28) died instantly when the car they were travelling in was in collision with a lorry at Goggins Hill in Ballinhassig, Co Cork.
In attendance at the crash victims' funeral services was Fr John O'Donovan, parish priest in Ballincollig, Co Cork, where the men lived at the time of their deaths.
Fr O'Donovan told the 400 strong congregation at all four Masses that it was a privilege and an honour to be able to share in their grieving and sadness.
He told the gathering that he had made friendships with many Polish people and given support to them in many different ways in the community. He said he travelled to the funeral on behalf of the Irish community and the people of Ballincollig to offer his sympathy to the people of Pisz.
An employer of one of the crash victims, Roy Coughlan, from Winthrop Engineering in Ballincollig, also attended yesterday's services.
Mr Coughlan was a close friend of Rafal Gorski, having worked alongside him for more than a year.
Roy Coughlan's girlfriend, Grace Gilwinka, also shared a house with the men when they first moved to Ireland.
Mr Coughlan said he was still trying to come to terms with the loss of "four vibrant men who were great fun and great craic". Grace Gilwinka said the men were among the best people she had ever met.
"I only know them since they came to Ireland but I never met people like them before. If only one person was working and three weren't working, the one person was paying for the three others in the house - they helped each other all the time."
Meanwhile, Andrzej Gorski, father of victim Rafal, has pledged to travel to Cork to meet his son's Irish friends.
The four men were interred in the same graveyard.