Court extends time for probe at Mallow fire site
Supt Pat McCarthy, who is leading the investigation into the deaths at the apartment in Mallow, Co Cork, got the order at the local district court and said gardaí were “still keeping an open mind” on how the fire was started.
Other Garda sources revealed they received preliminary autopsy and forensic reports following the fire at Granary Court on St Joseph’s Road, which broke out yesterday shortly after midnight on Wednesday. They said they wouldn’t release these details as the investigation was “ongoing”.
The victims were John Palmer, 37, originally from Tallaght, Co Dublin, and Greg Lonergan, 36, who was living in Mallow for a number of years, but was originally from another part of North Cork. Their bodies were found in a third-floor flat.
According to apartment block caretaker Pat O’Regan, John Palmer had moved in there prior to last Christmas and was staying with his brother, Chris, who along with an unidentified woman, was rescued by gardaí.
Supt McCarthy said without the intervention of gardaí Liam Phillips and Catriona O’Sullivan, there could have been four fatalities as they managed to save Chris Palmer and the woman.
“First they got out the male who was in the hallway. Then they heard cries and came back and found a woman in an apartment and brought her to safety.
“Unfortunately, they couldn’t save the other two because of the intense heat and smoke,” he said.
Chris Palmer and the woman continue to be treated in Cork University Hospital. The two brave gardaí were also treated there for smoke inhalation, but were later discharged. It is Grda Phillips’ second time saving people from a burning building.
It has emerged that gardaí were called to the apartment block following complaints about noise at 9.30pm on Wednesday.
They got to the blaze before the local fire brigade was alerted at 12.13am. Fire crews using breathing apparatus located the bodies of the two men in the sitting room of the apartment.
Gardaí say they want to speak to anybody who passed the apartment complex any time between 9.30pm and midnight on Wednesday.
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There was further heartbreak in Mallow after a 17-year-old boy was killed after apparently losing control of his car after swerving to avoid an animal.
The victim, named locally as Sean O’Neill from Ballyclough, was driving his silver Honda Civic back home from Davis College when he lost control of the vehicle on the Lisgriffin Road, a few kilometres north west of Mallow Hospital.
The car hit a ditch and overturned at around 4.15pm. The teenager had three passengers in the car. The passengers, two teenage girls and a teenage boy, were treated for shock.
A Garda spokesman said they were treating the teenager’s death as “a tragic accident”.
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