In an another black 24-hour period on the State's roads, two people died after a collision in Sligo and authorities named a five-year-old girl as the victim of a crash in Co Cork.
Orla O'Neill, a pupil at a national school in Rockchapel, Co Cork, was a passenger in a car being driven by her mother, a teacher at the same school, when it hit another vehicle on Monday.
The young girl, who was from Dromtarrife, Co Cork, died at Cork University Hospital on Monday night. Her mother and older sister, who was also in the car, were not seriously injured.
Yesterday, a man and a woman died after a head-on collision in Moneygold, Co Sligo, just hours before nearby Sligo town was due to host the launch of a road-safety awareness campaign.
The crash, involving a young man in a Mitsubishi Colt car with L plates and a woman driving a Nissan Almera, happened on a dry, straight stretch of wide road. The woman, who died at the scene, was named locally in Donegal as Myra Gamble (63), from Meenavoy, Ballybofey.
The driver of the Colt, a man in his 20s from Terenure, Dublin, died a short while later in Sligo General Hospital. A girl aged about eight who was in the back of the Nissan and a woman who was a front-seat passenger were taken to hospital and treated for injuries.
Both drivers had to be cut free from the vehicles by firemen using oxy-acetylene equipment. The crash scene was 20 metres from where 15-year-old Marie Rooney was killed by a car in 2005 while waiting for her school bus.
Local county councillor Patsy Barry said the road where the crash occurred "is so busy it's like a dual carriageway or a motorway. When an accident happens, the outcome is similar to what can happen on a motorway."
In Co Cork, staff and pupils at a national school in Rockchapel were in mourning yesterday after the death of Orla O'Neill, who was a member of the senior infants class.
The car in which she was travelling with her mother and older sister collided with another vehicle at Church Street in Newmarket at 5.30pm on Monday.
The driver of the other vehicle escaped serious harm.
The crash site was closed to traffic as Garda investigators worked at the scene. It reopened shortly before lunchtime yesterday. Gardaí have asked anyone who witnessed the incident to contact them at Kanturk station.
Local parish priest Fr David Herlihy said parishioners in Newmarket and Rockchapel were terribly saddened by Orla's death.
"It is dreadful. People are just numb. Orla was in senior infants in Rockchapel and Eileen is a teacher in the small school. Eileen is a native of Rockchapel but lives out in Dromtarrife. We just can't get over it."
Newmarket parish priest Fr Pat McCarthy said large numbers of parishioners attended mass in St Mary's Church in the town yesterday.
"Today is the Feast of All Saints and it is normally a joyous affair.
"But this morning the Mass was tinged with sadness. People are obviously devastated. We had double the usual numbers at Mass.
"Because Rockchapel is so close to us, a lot of people know the family involved.
"It comes a month almost to the exact day since two men from Newmarket died in a crash so it is very upsetting."
The two men, James (Jimmy) McAuliffe (39) and Gerard O'Keeffe (25), died on October 8th after their car collided with another vehicle as they made their way to a building site.