Backpacker’s mother hits out over death of daughter

● Hitchhiking tragedy on Skye blamed on ‘lack of tourist facilities’

The mother of a backpacker killed by a car while hitchhiking on Skye has said a lack of tourist facilities on the island was to blame.

Kerry Shannon, from Australia, said her daughter Maddy died in May 2016 because she and her boyfriend Joe Perry had no choice but to hitchhike after a night out.

Shesaidotherpeoplemaydie if the island’s roads and transport links are not dramatically improved.

Ms Shannon, 53, from Queensland, said: “We feel very strongly that the lack of tourist facilities on Skye is responsible for my daughter’s death and are very concerned that her death will not be the last one on this beautiful island.

“The roads are not designed for the kind of volume they have to contend with and the island itself doesn’t have the infrastructure needed to cope with the amount of tourism it is attracting. How long before someone else is killed?”

Her warning comes weeks after business owners warned that the island was struggling to cope with its growing popularity as a tourist destination, particularly during the peak summer months.

The surge in visitor numbers has seen virtually every tourist bed booked up, crowds at the most popular attractions and traffic congestion.

Miss Shannon, 21, her boyfriend Joe Perry and another friend were trying to make their way back to the Kinloch Lodge Hotel, where she was working, in the early hours of 6 June last year after a night out in another hotel bar.

But after being told no taxis were available and failing to contact any of their friends for a lift, they decided to try to hitch the 23-mile journey.

Ms Shannon, who visited Skye this summer with her husband and Maddy’s twin brother Harlan on the anniversary of her death, said: “They were stuck with no way to get home and no one to call for help. There were no buses, no taxis. They were told flagging down a car was the only thing to do.

“It could so easily have been avoided if there had been a taxi or a bus to take them home.

“A lot of pubs, clubs and restaurants in Australia provide courtesy buses or drivers for this reason.”

The group had tried to flag down five cars before an ambulance appeared. The on-duty crew warned Miss

0 Kerry Shannon with a portrait of her daughter Maddy, who was killed while hitchhiking on Skye Shannon – who was by then clearly distressed – and her friends they were putting themselves in danger by trying to thumb a lift so far out in the road, but said they were unabletoofferthemtransport

A Transport Scotland spokesman said: “Road safety is of paramount importance and the trunk road on Skye is assessed, along with the rest of the network, on an annual basis.”