Two more road deaths raise holiday fatalities total to six

Two people died in traffic accidents yesterday, bringing the bank holiday death toll on the roads to six.

A 52-year-old father of five was killed in a head-on collision on the N5 at Ballymiles near Swinford, Co Mayo, shortly before 3 a.m.

Mr Brendan Hopkins, from Knockthomas, Castlebar, had been driving two of his daughters and a friend to Dublin Airport for an early-morning flight to Edinburgh when the accident occurred.

Mr Hopkins's two children and their friend, who is from Sligo, were injured in the collision and admitted to Mayo General Hospital, Castlebar.

The driver of the other car, a man from the Castlebar area, was also injured and admitted to hospital. None of the injuries were said to be life-threatening.

Mr Hopkins was employed as a revenue collector with Mayo County Council. He is survived by his wife, Ina, and five children.

The Mayor of Castlebar, Mr Michael Kilcoyne, paid tribute to Mr Hopkins yesterday, saying: "Brendan was a tremendous community man and he is an immense loss to Castlebar. I would even say he is irreplaceable."

In Co Limerick, a young man was killed when the car he was driving collided with a jeep at Ballymatrix on the Rathkeale bypass at 3.15 a.m. yesterday.

Mr Thomas Clifford (25), single, of Ballymacave, Croagh, who worked as a machine driver, was pronounced dead on admission to the Mid-Western Regional Hospital in Limerick.

Six passengers in the car, which had been travelling from Newcastle West towards Limerick, were taken to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. Two people in the jeep suffered slight injuries.

The two brothers who were killed when their motorcycle collided with a car in Co Tipperary on Sunday night were named yesterday as Mr David Phelan (24) and Mr John Phelan (26), both of Baptist Grange, Fethard.

The accident occurred shortly before 8 p.m. at The Commons, a mile outside Fethard, on the main Clonmel road.