Ordinary people doing ordinary things

DEVASTATING LOSS The ten victims of the explosion in the village of Creeslough in Co Donegal on Friday. Top, from left: Leona Harper, Robert Garwe, Shauna Flanagan Garwe, Jessica Gallagher and James O’Flaherty. Bottom, from left: Martina Martin, Hugh Kelly, Catherine O’Donnell with her son James Monaghan and Martin McGill. Pic: An Garda SíochΡna

Donegal village faces heartbreaking week of funerals

IT was all anyone was talking about over the weekend just passed. News of an explosion at a petrol station in the quiet Donegal village of Cresslough broke late on Friday afternoon as many in the country were leaving work to enjoy their weekend.
But such was nature of the unfolding tragedy that the full extent of the catastrophe did not become apparent until much later.  
On Sunday at 12.30pm, the Garda Press Office named ten deceased – people who were just in the wrong place at the wrong time when the as-of-yet-unexplained explosion occurred.
The name and pictures they released were of James O’Flaherty, 48 years; Jessica Gallagher, 24 years; Martin McGill, 49 years; Catherine O’Donnell, 39 years, and her son James Monaghan, 13 years; Hugh Kelly, 59 years; Martina Martin, 49 years; Robert Garwe, 50 years and his daughter, Shauna Flanagan Garwe, 5 years; and Leona Harper, 14 years.
Ordinary people doing ordinary things, like buying a birthday cake for a mother or getting an ice-cream after school on a Friday evening.
As details for the funerals are confirmed, the country struggles alongside Creeslough, struggles to comprehend and imagine what the families and friends of these innocent victims must be going through.
We must remember too the emergency services who had to attend this scene of pure pandemonium. The professionalism, coordination and compassion of all those involved has been highly praised.  
The Garda Press Office confirmed on Friday evening that the emergency response had been led by the Donegal County Council Fire Service with assistance by An Garda SíochΡna, the National Ambulance Service, Irish Coast Guard, the Coast Guard Rescue 118 Helicopter, Irish Air Corps Medivac 112, Northern Ireland Ambulance HEMS, Irish Community Air Ambulance (Ground Crew), Northern Ireland Urban Search and Rescue, Meavagh Fire Service, Donegal Mountain Rescue, Northern Ireland Ambulance Service HART team (Hazardous Area Response Team) and the Donegal County Council Civil Defence, hundreds of professionals and volunteers who worked in desperate conditions to try and save lives.
For all to long, stories of explosions in Northern Ireland and its bordering counties were commonplace, innocent lives taken as part of a bitter feud that for decades dominated the news discourse on this island.
This was altogether different though.
The painstaking investigation into the cause of this deadly explosion is already well underway, and the root cause will eventually be established. But for now, the Cresslough community will come together for those grieving families and try and help them through what can only be described as every family’s worst nightmare.
As An Taoiseach Michéal Martin stated: “People across this island will be numbed by the same sense of shock and utter devastation as the people of Creeslough at this tragic loss of life.”
May those who died rest in peace.