had broken earlier that day<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\nThe circus convoy was on the\u00a0N26 between Swinford and Foxford when some of the drivers noticed a car driving erratically towards them veering across lanes.<\/p>\n
The Duffys said the car narrowly avoided the truck at the top of the convoy, before it swerved and collided with ringmistress Candice Duffy\u2019s vehicle. The car burst two of the caravan\u2019s tyres, and drove off.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of things that are happening currently in the country at the moment we are exposed to,\u201d said David Duffy, who has been a part of the circus since its foundation.\n<\/p>\n
Unfortunately we were exposed […] to this trend at the moment of cars driving down the wrong side of the road.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey drove in front of Tom who was leading the convoy, swung away from Tom, hit the ditch and then bounced back into the side of Tom and Candice\u2019s caravan which Candice was driving with my granddaughter in it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
And burst both tyres and smashed all the side of the trailer and then they went off down a side road, took off the registration plates, and done a runner.<\/p>\n
Candice Duffy said the incident was \u201cvery scary\u201d, but that the circus staff remained calm.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, it was scary,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
But we were calm enough and we dealt with it and we were back on the road within an hour because we\u2019re self-sufficient.<\/p>\n
A local family from a nearby house assisted the circus in directing traffic and Candice Duffy said that the garda\u00ed were contacted.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe only reason we did a public statement was because it was causing obstruction and the driver fled the scene so we wanted to make sure the public were aware that we weren\u2019t at fault for that obstruction being on the road and so we could get some assistance,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
In a statement garda\u00ed said:<\/p>\n
\u201cOn 16 August 2026 shortly after 8.30pm, garda\u00ed received a report of a material damage collision involving a lorry and car. The car failed to remain at the scene. No injuries were reported. Investigations remain ongoing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Duffy\u2019s Circus are currently holding shows in Tyrrelstown Dublin 15<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ONE OF IRELAND\u2019s oldest family circuses has spoken about their fear and concern after they were involved in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":620402,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[9272,7782,61,60,8764,43,49747,259685],"class_list":["post-620401","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-crash","tag-gardai","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-mayo","tag-news","tag-rtc","tag-tom-duffy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/620401","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=620401"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/620401\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/620402"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=620401"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=620401"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=620401"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}