A busy week for road accidents in Waterford
Emergency services at the scene of a collision by Ferrybank church last week. Photo: Ferrybank Focus
Multiple road traffic collisions were seen in Waterford over the past week, with a number of road users taken to University Hospital Waterford as a result.
A collision involving a car and cyclist occurred in St John’s Park, Waterford City, on the evening of Thursday, October 1.
The cyclist, who is understood to be a child, was subsequently brought to University Hospital Waterford with non-life-threatening injuries.
The driver and passenger of a car were also taken to hospital this week, following a separate two-car collision just outside Waterford city the following Tuesday, October 6.
The incident occurred on the R711 New Ross Road at Ferrybank, near the church, at around 10:40am on Tuesday morning, according to a Garda spokesperson.
Both the driver, a man aged in his 80s, and the passenger of one of the vehicles, a woman aged in her 70s, were taken to University Hospital Waterford to be treated for non-life threatening injuries after the collision.
The next day, Wednesday, October 7, a woman aged in her 60s was conveyed to hospital following a road traffic incident involving an emergency services van and a car.
The incident, which happened at around 10:20am on the Carrickphierish Road, led to the driver of the car being brought to hospital for treatment of injuries believed to be non-life threatening, this newspaper was told, with no other injuries reported at the scene.
The following morning, Thursday, October 8, emergency services attended the scene of a further road traffic accident in Waterford city.
The incident occurred on the R680 near the SETU Glassworks building on the Cork Road on Thursday morning, between a car and a motorcycle.
Both vehicles received significant damage, with the drivers of both the car and the motorcycle taken to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
Over the same week the four incidents occurred, a Waterford Garda Inspector said the number of drivers texting and watching videos while driving in Waterford is “scary”.
Divisional Roads Policing Inspector Paul Donohoe made the comments to WLR FM following a recent roads policing operation in Waterford where he said these behaviours were widely witnessed.
“We’ve moved into a sphere where people do everything with their phones,” he told WLR, “They cannot leave them out of their hands and that’s a problem when it comes to driving cars.”
“It’s absolutely scary the amount of people texting, looking at videos on phones while driving on the Quays in Waterford, around Ferrybank, on the link roads.”
Inspector Donohoe added that the increase in deaths on Waterford roads is hugely concerning, saying that the number of road fatalities in Waterford's policing area amounted to 10 last year, where seven deaths occurred in 2024, and three the year before.
