By: Evelyn Cullen
A prayer vigil will take place at 4pm today at St Mary’s Oratory, Buncrana, in memory of the two young men who tragically lost their lives after getting in to difficulty in the water yesterday afternoon near Ned’s Point, Buncrana.
Three young men, aged between 16 and 19 years of age were involved in the swimming tragedy which sparked a huge search and rescue operation when a member of the public raised the alarm shortly after 4pm.
The three teenagers were International Protection applicants with one of the deceased understood to have been from Zimbabwe and the other from Nigeria. They had been living in Buncrana for a number years and were much loved in the community.
A 16-year-old boy was taken from the sea after a search operation, but subsequently died in hospital in the early hours of this morning.
The body of an 18-year-old man was recovered from the water shortly before 10pm last night.
A third teenage boy managed to swim ashore following the incident and Gardaí have said he “is in no danger and should make a full recovery”.
Local councillor Fionán Bradley helped to organise today’s vigil and has encouraged everyone to come together to support the families at this difficult time.
“Myself and the parish priest organised (the vigil) late last night. There was this burning desire to do something to pull the community in together, and pull the refugee community in and show them that we are all supporting them the best that we possibly can through this terrible, terrible tragedy.”
“I would absolutely encourage everybody to come along, so we can all support each other and support the communities that are in Buncrana and that have made it their home.”
Local councillor Jack Murray visited the IPAS centre and said the community “are absolutely devastated”.
“There’s no words that you can describe how hurt everybody is – their community, our community. We’re as one as we grieve this horrible news,” he said.
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