The death of a young mother, on her way to hospital to see her baby when a truck collided with the back of a car in which she was a passenger, highlighted the need for truck-drivers to take appropriate rest periods and avoid fatigue, a coroner has said.
A garda technical expert who examined the stretch of motorway in Co Tipperary where Nicola Kenny (26) was killed in 2016 concluded that "driver error" by a truck driver contributed to the fatal collision.
The car in which Nicola was a back-seat passenger, with her aunt driving and her mother in the front seat, was stopped on the hard shoulder of the M8 when a lorry approaching from behind collided with it, sending it down a grass embankment and killing the young woman instantly.
An inquest in Clonmel found that she died as a result of multiple traumatic injuries consistent with a road traffic collision and accidental death.
A deposition from one witness heard that he was travelling north on the M8, at Dogstown, New Inn, between the Cahir and Cashel exits, when he saw a truck in the slow lane.
As he overtook this truck, he noticed the driving was “erratic” and the truck was veering towards the hard shoulder. “I didn’t have a good feeling,” Mr Foley said of the driving of the truck.
As he continued ahead of this truck, he observed in his rear-view mirrors that the truck continued onto the hard shoulder and he then noticed a Ford Focus pulled in on the hard shoulder. “I saw the front left of the truck collide with the back right side of this car.”
The Ford Focus ended up going down into a ditch, he said, and he phoned the emergency services.
Suspended sentence
The driver of the truck, Ciaran McBride from 38 Tivenmara Road, Carna, Keady, Co Armagh, was given a suspended prison sentence last year after he pleaded guilty to careless driving causing death.
The circuit court case heard at the time that Nicola Kenny, who was from Kennedy Park in Thurles, was being driven to Temple Street Hospital in Dublin to visit her new baby daughter, who had been transferred to Temple Street from South Tipperary General Hospital in Clonmel for medical attention.
It was also heard in court last year that Nicola’s aunt, the driver of the Ford Focus, had pulled into the hard hard shoulder to allow Nicola take a call from Temple Street to tell her the baby was fine.
Garda Declan Corrigan told the inquest on Friday that the judge in the criminal case last year "said he believed driver fatigue was a contributing factor" to the fatal crash.
The coroner, Paul Morris, said: "On the signs we see on the motorway, 'Tiredness Kills,' it does actually apply in this case."
Paramedic Michael McGrath said he was off-duty at the time of the crash, 12.30pm on September 5th, 2016, but came upon the scene in his car. He established that Nicola Kenny was deceased while her mother was injured and her aunt was seriously injured.
A local GP, Dr William Ryan, pronounced Nicola dead at 1.42pm.
Neither of the other women in the car at the time was present at the inquest, but Nicola's father Paddy Kenny was present.
Sergeant Niamh Brosnan, a crash-scene expert, said she came to the conclusion following her investigation that "this collision was due to driver error".
The Coroner then said that the case “really highlights that lorry drivers should obey their tachograph and take their rest”.
A pathologist’s report was read out in court and referred to injuries sustained by Nicola which included multiple rib fractures, a fracture to the upper thoracic spine and lacerations to the lungs and liver.
The jury returned a verdict in line with the medical evidence, that death was caused by multiple traumatic injuries consistent with involvement in a road crash, and accidental death.
They also added a recommendation that commercial drivers should abide by “safe driving times” and “appropriate rest periods” to avoid fatigue and causing danger to other road-users.