A family of emigrés, enjoying a holiday in Portugal from the UK, died in horrendous circumstances when the car they were travelling in came off the road, and burst into flames ‘in the very early hours of Saturday morning’ near Castro Verde.
Also travelling in the car, and killed alongside father, mother and twin sons, was a 19-year-old Polish girl, named only as ‘Veronica’ – the girlfriend of one of the sons.
The driver of the other car involved in this incident – Rúben Gonçalves, a young father who worked in the local Somincor (Neves-Corvo) mine – also died.
It is unclear what exactly caused this terrible accident. The car in which the family was travelling was coming from the Algarve, heading for Mourão (near the Spanish border) when it appears to have collided head-on with Gonçalves’ car at kilometer 387.5, at roughly 1.20am.
The alert however was only sounded at 2.06am – the delay not having been explained beyond the fact that it was very late at night, and there were no witnesses.
At first, investigators were at a loss as to the identity of the five victims as they had been badly burnt along with the car and all its contents. It was only much later in the day (after the debris had been cleared and the road was once again open to traffic) that a call to GNR police from the family’s surviving daughter at their home in Thetford, near Norwich, (prompted by the fact that she could not reach any of her loved ones by phone) enabled them to piece information together.
The car that had burst into flames belonged to a hire company in Faro. This was able to confirm the identity of its customer: Domingos Serrano, 55 – husband of Maria, 51 and father of 20-year-old sons Domingos and Afonso.
With the added information from the distraught daughter in UK, it was sadly a simple matter to confirm identities of the five charred corpses.
It is only a couple of months since the European Transport Safety Council described deaths on Portugal’s roads as a “steady trend” that seemingly resists all forms of awareness campaigns (when other countries have been showing marked improvements over the years).
Mourão marks tragedy by cancelling all weekend events
In reaction to the terrible news, Mourão town council (Évora district) has expressed its condolences over social media and declared two days of municipal mourning (to be observed today and tomorrow).
On its Facebook page, the council described the Serrano family as four people “born in Mourão”, while Veronica had “an affinity with the family”.
“Residents in England, they were heading from Faro to Mourão, for their usual and well-deserved vacation,” said the post.
Offering condolences to the family and friends of the victims, the council also announced that “all activities and events promoted by the municipality have been canceled for the entire weekend.”
In the UK, Sky News also marked the tragedy, giving air to the local Thetford football team for which the two sons used to play. The family was described by the club as “lovely”.
Source: LUSA/ SIC Notícias/ Correio da Manhã/ Sky News
