The Frisian village of Sibrandabuorren is in deep mourning on Sunday. Three of the four men who died in a single-vehicle accident on Saturday evening came from there. “This touches many people deeply,” says mayor Jannewietske de Vries of Súdwest-Fryslân.
Four men, aged 35, 39, 39 and 41, were killed in the accident in Jirnsum in Friesland. Three of them therefore come from Sibrandabuorren, the other victim from Britswert. Mayor De Vries how the accident hit the small communities hard: “It concerns small villages,” says De Vries. “They are men from the villages, it touches everyone very deeply.”
The four friends were on their way to a party at an eatery in Jirnsum on Saturday evening, it writes Newspaper of the North. On the Rijksweg, the car and the company went off the road, drove into a tree and ended up in the ditch. None of the occupants survived the accident, which took place around 9:25 p.m.
Terribly deep sorrow
“There is a large circle of friends around the four victims,” De Vries outlines the impact of the accident. “This is such a terribly deep sadness. For the families, for the relatives, friends, people from the villages. Today we try to process it a bit and see how we can support the relatives as best as possible.”
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At first I didn’t know who it was, but that didn’t take long. It comes in very hard, we all know each other here
Sibrandabuorren is a small village, about 365 people live there. Hedser Bruinsma, chairman of the village interest, heard the news about the accident early Sunday morning. “A very loud laugh,” he says Omrop Friesland. “I didn’t know who it was then, but that didn’t take long. It comes in very hard, we all know each other here.”
Speed
It is not yet clear how the accident happened. The Forensic Investigation Traffic conducted an investigation on Saturday evening. There are a number of houses on the Rijksweg, the police are checking whether they may have taken camera images when the car in question passed. “That could provide information about how the car was driven and at what speed,” said a spokesman for the North Netherlands Police.
The police are also still looking for witnesses. Talks have already been made with people who have learned something about the accident on the spot. “They said that there may still be cyclists present when the accident happened. It is not clear whether that was one cyclist or several. We would like to get in touch with that.”
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