A North Mayo community was in a state of shock last night as the search for a man missing after a freak car accident involving three local men wound down after dusk. One man survived, and the body of the third was recovered from the sea. They had been hunting a fox.
Sources say the car left the road and carried on down to the slip-way after the men spotted a fox. It is believed that as the men stopped the car to "lamp" the fox - a practice which involves attaching a long-beam lamp to the battery to dazzle and stun the animal - two got out to shoot the fox with a rifle.
As they did so, the car is said to have moved forward and dropped over the pier into the sea, taking the driver with it. Confusion still surrounds what happened next, but between rescue attempts and the car plunging into the sea, all three men were caught up in the estuary waters, which are believed to have the second-strongest currents in the seas around Ireland. The body of Mr Paddy Doherty was retrieved from the sea shortly after 4 a.m. yesterday when the alert was raised.
A second man, Mr Wesley Henry, in his early 20s, escaped injury in the accident although he was also caught up in the Glenamoy estuary waters for a time. The missing man is Mr Declan Sweeney, a 35-year-old single man and plumber. All three neighbours from the village of Glengad, which has a population of about 200, were on a fox-hunting expedition.
Mr Henry was recovering at home yesterday from his ordeal. Mr Doherty was a 38-year-old married man with four children. A part-time fisherman and farmer, he had expert knowledge of the dangerous Glenamoy waters, but the accident occurred at high tide, leaving him at the mercy of the currents. As the full impact of the tragedy hit the close-knit community of Glengad yesterday, crowds of people from all over the Belmullet Peninsula collected at the scene to observe and participate in the search.
The atmosphere was marked by silence as people lined the coast, helplessly looking out to sea at the rescue teams and divers as they searched for the missing man.
Across the road in McGrath's pub, where the alert was first raised, family members of the three men and concerned friends joined in the vigil.
The scene resembled a mortuary as hand after hand was extended in friendship and sympathy to those directly affected by the tragedy.
Conditions for the search were as good as could be expected, according to Supt Tony McNamara, of Belmullet, who said it had been a long night and day for everybody.
"The tide is low during the day, but the estuary is one of the most treacherous and has one of the fastest-moving waters around the Irish coast.
"It appears that the three lads drove down the slip-way to shine their lights on a fox. There is a 30 to 40-degree incline on the pier, which is covered in seaweed, and you could see how a car would quite easily slip over it," he said.
Supt McNamara added that the body of Mr Doherty was found on a sandbar approximately one mile from the pier.
He complimented all parties involved in the search - the Belmullet Fire Brigade, the Air Corps, Ballyglass Coast and Cliff Rescue, the Garda divers and the local people - while highlighting the lack of telecommunications in the area which made it difficult to co-ordinate information.
He said the tragedy was a huge blow to the small western community, which could ill-afford to lose three young men.
The search for the missing man will resume at first light this morning.