Bus Éireann has apologised for allowing a simulated bus crash to be reported as fact in the media yesterday.
The company's managing director, Mr Bill Lilly, said he took "full responsibility" for the issuing of a misleading press releases to news organisations throughout the country, describing it as an "embarrassing" error.
An initial press release, issued shortly after 11 a.m. yesterday, said a coach on Bus Éireann's Dublin-Rosslare route had crashed just south of the Rathnew bypass in Co Wicklow.
A second press release, issued just before noon, claimed 11 of the 30 passengers on board had been injured, two seriously.
Bus Éireann spokesman Mr Barry Coyle informed reporters who contacted him about the releases that the bus had crashed on a "narrow twisty part" of the N11, adding that the injured had been taken to Loughlinstown and St Vincent's hospitals.
Several media outlets sent reporters to the scene only to discover that a simulation had been taking place.
In the meantime, news of the bogus crash had been carried on early-morning radio bulletins.
Mr Lilly said: "I'd like to apologise profusely to anyone who was upset by this announcement. I am quite sure there were people who had friends and relations possibly travelling on the service and would naturally be very upset by what happened."
He said he had made the mistake of failing to inform Mr Coyle that the event was a simulation before travelling from the company's Broadstone headquarters in north Dublin to the "crash" site.
Mr Coyle said an incident room had been established in the managing director's office after Mr Lilly had left, and various managers "were all playing roles" consistent with a real emergency. "Everyone in the room was aware it was a simulation except me."
Mr Lilly added: "Nobody knew it was going to take place this morning, except our risk manager and myself, who were setting the thing up. In order to test the response, obviously, you keep it as quietly as possible to that point in time.
"We are embarrassed by it, and again, all I can say is we apologise profusely to everyone."
Mr Coyle, who took over responsibility for communications in Bus Éireann just last month in the place of long-serving spokesman Mr Cyril McIntyre, said he learned that yesterday's "crash" was a simulation only minutes after sending out the second press release.
"Phones in the incident room started to jump, and then it started to dawn on people these were live phone calls."
He noted Mr Lilly had yesterday morning asked senior managers to the managing director's office, where the simulation was announced. Mr Coyle said his office was some distance from the managing director's, and as a result, "I was not there at that second when it was announced. I just happened not to be in the room."
