A 20-year-old driver who collided with an oncoming vehicle at Knockroe Bridge in Ballydehob was fined €850 for careless driving.

Flor Murphy, solicitor, said his client Frank Goggin of Gloun, Schull, had checked with the occupants of the other vehicle to make sure they were okay before he was taken to hospital to receive treatment for concussion, a broken rib, and bruised lungs.

It subsequently emerged that the woman who had been in the passenger seat of the other car sustained a broken sternum even though the vehicle’s airbags had deployed.

Mr Murphy said his client, a plant machine operator, couldn’t recall how the accident at the bridge happened but he accepted that he was probably going too fast.

Mr Murphy said there was no question of his client being intoxicated that night because he had been at home all evening with his parents and only left the house to call to see his girlfriend.

The driver of the other vehicle said the accused’s car appeared all of a sudden, without lights, and they were hit from the front.

The solicitor said Frank Goggin admitted liability for the accident, which occurred at the brow of a humpbacked bridge.

Judge Joanne Carroll imposed a monetary fine which carries no other penalty, or endorsement, saying: ‘He should be allowed to move on.’