Mr McGrotty handed him his baby out the broken driver’s side window just moments before the Audi Q7 sank.
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“When he came back he was totally exhausted”. I think it will take a long time for this to set in, for her to realise what actually has happened.
“We all know in our own lives the numbing grief that comes with the loss of a loved one”.
“I couldn’t do nothing else, the auto went down instantly, the whole lot went down, and then it was just so fast and I just took the baby infant back into shore”.
Emergency services attend a auto that plunged into the sea in Buncrana, Ireland.
Two lifeboats, a helicopter, and local fishing boats were dispatched to the scene, but they were unable to save the family in time.
“It was harrowing and heart-rending”.
“I went up there thinking it was nothing serious”.
The last thing that the father said to Walsh was, “Save the baby”. “I couldn’t have imagined it. I felt so hopeless, watching it unfolding it in front of your eyes”, Crawford told the BBC.
Mr Walsh said the algae was “absolutely lethal”.
Another could be seen floating further out from shore and a “smaller image” was visible out in the water. “And the auto went down”.
Mr Crawford said emergency services brought bodies to the pier and tried to resuscitate them.
Speaking at the scene earlier, Northern Ireland’s Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness said the communities in Derry and Donegal would have to throw their arms around the bereaved family.
“I just feel really, really bad that I couldn’t do any more for the family. Inadequate as it is, everyone at the club wants to assure him that they will be with him in the coming days and, more importantly, in the weeks and months that lie ahead”.
Jack Murray, local Sinn Fein councillor in Inishowen, said the accident had brought back memories of past tragedies.
Oran Doherty, eight, and 12-year-olds Sean McLoughlin and James Barker had been on a day trip to Omagh with a group of Spanish students who had been attending a summer programme in the Co Donegal town.
“I don’t know what to say about it, it’s just terrible”, he said.
It is believed the family passed the baby out to the rescuer through the window before their vehicle sank near Buncrana Pier.
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“We are treating this as a very tragic incident”, he said. Five of them tragically met their deaths when the vehicle they were in slipped into the water and became submerged.
