Irish couple killed in Rome road crash named

Rebecca Black, PA

Updated: 11am. Additional reporting by Olivia Kelleher.

Two Irish people who died in a crash in Rome have been named as Paul and Mary Reilly from Co Wexford.

The Irish Times reports the couple, aged 59 and 60, were from the Kilmore area in the south of the county.

They died just before lunchtime on Thursday while crossing a dual carriageway at an intersection on the Cristoforo Colombo in the south of the city.

Mrs Reill's cousin, Fine Gael Councillor in Wexford Jim Moore, said the words "stunned and shocked" failed to adequately convey their sense of disbelief about the tragedy.

Speaking to RTÉ radio's Today with Claire Byrne, Cllr Moore said they are on "on a long journey of trying to come to terms with the shock of it all".

"We will gather around as a family and a community to support their children," he said, adding there is a feeling of "stunned silence" in the area.

Cllr Moore said the couple had married a number of years back and were well known and liked in Kilmore.

"Mary worked in the community centre as well as being busy as a seamstress. Paul worked in the marine industry. When he came from Dublin first he was involved in the fishing industry.

"Over a number of years he had moved in to the broader maritime world and received professional qualifications in Western Europe for the last many years and coming home very regularly to his family. The family often travelled out to meet him as well."

He said the pair were a very couple, adding: "They took a week’s holidays out of their work schedule and this was the start of a holiday period for both of them."

He said the family are liaising with the Department of Foreign Affairs and the authorities in Rome in relation to the repatriation of their bodies.

Meanwhile, speaking to the same programme, Kilmore Parish Priest, Fr Patrick Mernagh said his phone has not stopped ringing since word started to filter through of what had happened.

"People were saying ‘is it true? is it true?’ There is disbelief among the whole community here because Mary’s own family of Jim and Wally and Ella and Kay, her brothers and sisters, are so intertwined in the community.

"Everyone is very close. It is a very tight knit community. Everyone would know Mary and Paul. It is just a sad thing thinking there they were looking forward to having a little holiday for themselves.

"I know next week they were going to take the two grandchildren to Disneyland for a special holiday for them. It is just such a tragic, tragic situation," Fr Mernagh said.

He added: "We have put two candles on the altar of the church here today in memory of Paul and Mary, and we are opening a condolences book at one o'clock so that people can come in and saw whatever is in their heart.

"We have to think of their own boys, Andrew and Darren. It is one of those nightmares that none of us would ever want to have."