Four Year Old "Critical" After Hit By Lorry

A four year-old boy has been hit by a lorry while playing with his friends in Cork.

The boy's parents are maintaining a bedside vigil as Kelvin Purcell of Ardcullen, Knocknaheeny, Cork, fights for his life.

The child was out playing a game with some with his friends and was apparently obscured from the view of a passing truck driver.

He was caught by the rear wheels of the rigid-body truck and sustained multiple crush injuries.

The driver of the truck was believed to have been badly shaken by the incident, and was treated at the scene for shock as paramedics rushed the little boy to Cork University Hospital.

Compounding the families hardship, it has emerged the accident was the second tragedy to hit the respected local family over recent years.

In October 2000, the family lost five year-old boy, Daniel, who died when after getting trapped in an upstairs room during a house fire at the family home in Ardcullen.

The boy's parents and three siblings were rescued during a frantic operation, and their mother, who managed to get them downstairs as smoke and flames engulfed the top floor of the house, saved two of the children.

(DW)