Drink driving up - Dundalk

By Sheena Brothers Dundalk Democrat

LOCAL drink driving detection rates for the Halloween Bank Holiday weekend are up a shocking 35% on the same period for last year.

Inspector Martin Smethers, who heads the local Traffic Corps, revealed that 125 extra random breath test checkpoints were set up at the weekend."These were extremely successful yielding a 35 per cent increase in the detection of drink drivers on last year."Gardai also ran a series of special operations for the interception of fireworks and as a result uncovered a considerable number of illegal fireworks.

The largest seizure was a truck load of fireworks valued at €15,000, destined for sale in this jurisdiction, which was discovered by a checkpoint on the Newry Road."That was a particularly large seizure but we also discovered a number of smaller consignments over the period," said Dundalk Gardai.