By Michael Breslin
COLLEAGUES of a firefighter, who had just finished a road collision demonstration to them, had to cut him free after his car struck a wall and overturned near Castlederg.
The firefighter, 36-year-old Paul O'Brien, died at the scene.
He was on his way home on Thursday night to Ardess near Kesh in Co Fermanagh to his wife and three young children.
Mr O'Brien, a native of Co Wexford, was a member of the NI Fire and Rescue Service's Road Rescue Team. He had just finished instructing colleagues in Castlederg Fire Station on the latest cutting techniques in vehicle occupant rescue.
Just after Killen village, about a mile from Castlederg, his car struck a wall going round a right-hand bend, rolled over and ended up in a ditch shortly after 9.30pm on Thursday night last. He was on his own at the time. His shocked colleagues arrived within minutes, putting into practice what he had been teaching them minutes before. Mr O'Brien died at the scene.
His line manager on the Road Rescue Team, Omagh man Paddy Quinn, had been with Paul at the vehicle cutting demonstration in Castlederg Fire Station minutes before he was killed.
"It was spooky for the men when they went to the scene for the casualty was in the exact same position as in the demonstration Paul had given. It was like someone had put one on top of the other," said Paddy.
Watch Commander Quinn, referring to the two-year pilot that he, Paul and two others were involved in, explained that it was geared to reducing trauma among vehicle occupants in a road traffic accident.
He spoke of Paul's sheer enthusiasm for his new job, which he took up just ten days earlier.
"This was our very first demonstration and Paul's preparation for it was he got onto the lap-top to look at cutting techniques and, in that way, enhance the presentation he gave to the men in Castlederg.
"Little did they think that someone who had seen Paul's car crash and overturn would phone them and get them to call and that they would end up cutting him out of a car."
There were many tributes spoken about Paul's gentle manner, not least by Paddy Quinn himself: "If you met him once, you would feel you had known him for life."
Mr O'Brien's qualities as a husband of Anita and father to Ríona (9), Evie (7) and Tiana (5) were articulated at the hugely-attended funeral Mass in St Joseph's Church, Ederney on Monday morning where he was afforded full NI Fire and Rescue Service honours. The representation was led by the Chief Fire Officer, Colin Lammey and the Deputy Chief Fire Officer, Eoin Doyle.
The chief celebrant, Fr Brendan Gallagher, PP, spoke of a shocked community, and how that same community had rallied round to support Anita and her three children.
He spoke of the huge tribute that his colleagues in the Fire and Rescue Service were giving by their presence, and reflected on the circumstances of the accident, and how colleagues Paul had been instructing earlier were the ones who responded to the emergency call.
"He was a huge, big, strong physical man, and he was recognised as such", he said. "He had a physical presence about him and he was well-known around the church and the school. He brought his children back and forth to both."
The burial was in the old cemetery at Kinawley, in the grave of Paul's parents-in-law's.
