Coroner calls for compulsory truck mirrors

Dublin city coroner Dr Brian Farrell has said that he has written to the Department of Transport on a number of occasions asking for compulsory installation of mirrors to reduce a truck driver’s blind spot.

These mirrors are not a requirement. Dr Farrell was speaking at an inquest into the death of a cyclist who died when he entered the blind spot of a truck driver on the roundabout off the East Link toll bridge.
Dr Farrell will now write to the Department of Transport, the Road Safety Authority and Road Haulage Association.

An EU directive will come into Ireland on January 26th, 2007. This will make cyclops mirrors a requirement on new trucks.
Jimmy Quinn of the Irish Road Haulage Association said his group had campaigned for a number of years that mirrors become compulsory to pass the annual Department of the Environment truck test. He said that it should be “immediately enforced”.

The court heard that Peter Heffernan (58), Newbridge Avenue, Sandymount, Dublin, died from injuries when a truck hit him as he entered its blind spot on August 5th, 2005. A verdict of accidental death was returned.
The jury recommended that the footpath leading up to the roundabout from the East Link toll bridge be converted into a cycle-path.

The dead man’s son, Richard Heffernan, asked that the law be changed so that his father’s death would not be in vain.