Three people injured as car ploughs into crowd at Belfast cemetery

Man arrested as onlookers ‘bewildered’ over collision after funeral

Three men were injured when a car ploughed into a crowd of mourners leaving a funeral in Belfast.

A witness was reported to have said one of the three – who were all rushed to hospital – was seriously hurt.

Police arrested another man after the collision, which left people gathered outside the city’s cemetery shaken up.

Ambulance, fire crews and police were called to the scene at Whiterock Road in west Belfast after the collision around noon.

Photographs showed two cars and a van badly damaged as forensics officers gathered clues to what happened.

The extent of the injuries of those being treated is not known.

The Police Service of Northern Ireland tweeted: “Three men are being treated in hospital following the collision outside the city cemetery in west Belfast. The road remains closed and is likely to be closed for some time.”

Fr Patrick McCafferty told the BBC: “People were standing around in shock, people are stunned.

“They’re bewildered something like this could happen, just literally after the funeral had been completed. It’s unbelievable.”

UTV reported that a local councillor described the scene as “carnage” and believed the crash was caused by “death drivers”.

Michael Donnelly, a Sinn Fein councillor, told the Belfast Telegraph there had been earlier reports of a vehicle being driving erratically in west Belfast.

“People were just returning back from a funeral that took place in the city cemetery just off the Whiterock Road and a vehicle ploughed into three pedestrians on the footpath,” he told the paper.

Last month, a grandfather was seriously injured when a car drove at high speed into crowds at a cemetery in Co Louth, in the Irish Republic.