HOLIDAY TERROR
Family’s narrow escape in Barcelona
A DAY of holiday sightseeing turned to terror for a number of Wexford people who had a narrow escape after being caught up in the Barcelona attack which brought carnage to Las Ramblas, killing 14 people and injuring more than 100 others.
Vincent Lawlor and his wife Sandra of Shanna Court in Coolcotts, who were in Barcelona with their teenage son Darragh and his girlfriend Becca Adamson, said a random decision to go to a restaurant around the corner from the tourist hot spot probably saved their lives.
‘We took a turn in one direction, if we had walked the other way, we could have gone to our deaths. It probably saved our lives. When we think about it like that, it’s very scary,’ said the telephone engineer who sought refuge with his family in the restaurant for four hours and witnessed a stampede of frightened tourists fleeing from the scene of the attack.
Meanwhile Nóirín Doyle from Camross who was in Barcelona on a city break, said the aftermath of the terror attack was ‘absolute mayhem with people screaming and running to get away.’
‘I couldn’t understand what people were saying but I knew something terrible had happened,’ said Nóirín whose family spent an anxious hour and a half trying to contact her after she left her phone behind in the hotel for safe-keeping.
‘You feel lucky and you feel bad for saying that when there were so many people who weren’t lucky,’ said the recruitment consultant.
‘WE took a turn in one direction, if we had walked the other way we could have gone to our deaths. When we think about it like that, it’s very scary’, said Wexfordman Vincent Lawlor of Shanna Court, Coolcotts who found himself, along with members of his family, at the centre of the terror attacks in Barcelona last week.
Vincent, an engineer with Wexford Communications Ltd. was on a coach trip to Barcelona with his wife Sandra, his son Darragh and Darragh’s girlfriend Becca Adamson during a two-week holiday in Salou, when a white van ploughed into tourists and shoppers on the popular Las Ramblas boulevard last Thursday afternoon, killing 14 people and injuring dozens more.
A spur of the moment decision to take a tour guide’s restaurant recommendation potentially saved the lives of the Lawlor family who found themselves heading towards a second threat later that night when another horror incident took place in Cambrils, a short distance from Salou, where five terrorists were shot by police.
Speaking from Salou where they are staying until this Thursday, a still-shaken Vincent recounted the unforgettable experience of being caught for hours in the horror lock-down zone and witnessing hundreds of people stampeding through the streets in a desperate bid to get away from Las Ramblas.
After a visit to the Sagrada Familia cathedral, the coach stopped at the Hard Rock Cafe, a short distance from Las Ramblas, Darragh wanted to eat in the iconic restaurant but Vincent and Sandra had been to Barcelona before and suggested they go to a small restaurant around the corner which had been booked by the female tour guide.
‘If we had gone to the Hard Rock Cafe, it was only about 20 yards from Las Ramblas,’ said Vincent who couldn’t help contemplating what might have happened if they had taken that option.
‘We were sitting in the restaurant for about 10 minutes when we heard a lot of police cars. We could see them out the window. When we finished our meal, we left and started walking back towards the Hard Rock Cafe which was the meeting point for the bus.’
‘We saw people running into the shops, shouting and screaming. There were people stampeding in the street, hundreds of people. We didn’t know what was happening. Your mind is in a very different place when you are on holiday. You’re more so relaxed, you don’t react as quick.’
‘We met a young couple from Northern Ireland. They told us there had been a terrorist attack. We thought we’d better get out of here. The police came to close down the restaurants and the shops. They were on the scene so fast. All the businesses were told to pull down the shutters and close everything down.’
‘We went back to the restaurant. We were there for about four hours. The owners were very good to us. They asked if we wanted water and drinks. We felt scared. It’s the fact that you don’t know what’s happening.’
‘What was worrying us as well was that some of the famililies with us on the coach tour went in the direction of Las Ramblas. We were nervous about that. The bus was to meet us back at the same place but because the area was cordoned off, the guide rang and changed the meeting point. We were in the middle of the lock-down area.’
‘At 7 pm, the police came and told us we could leave. We were directed through the cordons. On the way back to Salou, we were in traffic for two and a half hours due to police and army checkpoints. They narrowed the traffic from four lanes down to one.’
‘When we got back on the bus, there were 15 people missing including a family of four from the UK, a Chinese family and two Russian people whom I had been speaking to on the journey to Barcelona. Some people wouldn’t have known about the change of meeting place because, unlike us, they weren’t in the restaurant with the tour guide. She went off looking for them but it was like searching for a needle in a haystack. All we can do is pray that hopefully, they weren’t anywhere near what happened.’
On returning to their apartment in Salou, they switched on Sky News to discover that a second terrorist attack had taken place in the seaside town of Cambrils, a 15-minute walk away from where they were staying, with five terrorists wearing fake explosive vests having been shot dead by police after a car drove into pedestrian, killing one woman and injuring six people including a police officer.
‘You felt the threat again. We had escaped one threat and headed in the direction of another one we didn’t know about. My wife and my son and girlfriend were upset,’ said Vincent, adding that they had telephoned relatives in Wexford
on the bus back to Salou to let them know they were safe.
‘Sandra rang our two daughters Orlaith and Ciara to reassure them and let them know we were okay. We were able to tell them where we were.’
‘We were nervous about staying for another week but when we woke up this morning, we looked out from the balcony and life was going on as normal. It could happen any place. They’re not selective about where they do this.’
‘It will take us a couple of days to get back to trying to enjoy the rest of the holiday. In our minds, we can’t help thinking about what could have happened. We took a turn one way and if we had taken a turn the other way we might not be here. It probably saved our lives,’ said Vincent.