A two-year-old boy died yesterday in a horrific accident in which his parents were seriously injured.
The child and his mother were in a car travelling behind his father's car when they were crushed under the wheels of a heavy goods lorry as they approached the bridge at Slane, Co Meath, just after midday.
He was named as David Garvey, Slane Village, who would have celebrated his second birthday on Friday. His father, Mr Cathal Garvey and his mother, Joan, were seriously ill last night. Mr Garvey was in intensive care at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda. His mother was brought to the Mater Hospital.
The lorry-driver, from Port rush, Co Antrim, was arrested and held for questioning.
Gardai suspect the lorry's air brakes may have failed on the steep hill. It went out of control and drove over the two cars, trapping their occupants underneath.
One of the first gardai at the scene said the lorry's timber load would have made it more difficult for the driver to stop.
The mother and son were travelling in a white Nissan Almera; the father was driving a Toyota Corolla.
Four people from one family in Dunleer, Co Louth, were in a Renault Clio. They were relatively unharmed after the lorry shunted their car forward as it was slowing at the traffic lights on the one-way narrow stone bridge.
Slane Bridge has seen numerous serious traffic accidents. Last year two people were killed there, and yesterday a local garda said: "This situation is getting ridiculous, Slane needs to be bypassed. There have been traffic lights at the bridge for the last 15 years or so and there are motorists who do not obey them. We are frequently down here directing the traffic."
A B & B proprietor, Mr Peader Hevey, lives beside the bridge and telephoned the emergency services yesterday. "Several lorries have come into our driveway and used it as a slip road to avoid crashing into the bridge," he said. "They have hit the wall here, the garden and my car." He believes the drivers take the evasive action to avoid going over the side of the bridge, as has happened in the past.
Members of the fire service from Drogheda, Navan, Ashbourne and Dunshaughlin, with ambulances and paramedics attended yesterday's crash.
It took over an hour to free the boy's father, who is a fireman with Dublin Fire Brigade. The family had moved to Slane four years ago.
The bridge is the only Boyne crossing on the N2.
The chairman of Meath County Council, Mr Conor Tormey, who saw the aftermath of the crash, said: "The National Roads Authority must look seriously now at putting a new bridge here."
Mr Kenneth Higgins (19), of Murroe, Co Limerick, died when his car hit a lamp-post at Moyross, Limerick, early yesterday morning.
A man in his 50s died in a two-car collision yesterday evening at Killakee Road, Rathfarnham, Dublin. Three other people were taken to Tallaght Hospital, one with injuries which gardai said were serious but not life-threatening.