Services provide 'solace' for road death families

Two memorial services held for people killed in road crashes provided "solace" for friends and family, a vicar has said.

Reverend Dom Jones, who led a service in Winchester, said people took "great comfort" in attending and meeting other bereaved families.

The Joint Operations Road Policing Unit of Hampshire and Isle of Wight Constabulary and Thames Valley Police held two memorial services on Sunday for people who had died on roads in Hampshire, the Isle of Wight and Thames Valley.

Gordon and Anne Thick, whose son John died in 1999 the night before his wedding, said the service gave them a chance to "focus" on him.

Mrs Thick said they thought about their son every day but it was "an opportunity to focus and also [come together] as a community who've all suffered the same sort of bereavement".

She said the grief of losing a child was "a life sentence" but "you learn to walk with it".

"Sometimes John is over there, walking sort of in tandem with me," she said.

"Other days he's right by me and that's when there's days I'm thinking about him a lot more… although he's not here in body, his essence of being John comes along with us in life."

Mr Jones, the lead chaplain at Hampshire and Isle of Wight Constabulary, said deaths on the road had "a ripple effect".

He said: "It's not just one or two people who are affected by deaths on our roads.

"The effects are so wide, they reach out to family, friends, local communities, sometimes schools, collages universities, and of course to our emergency services personnel who are attending these incidents."

Mr Jones said for the attendees of the service - which included emergency services personnel - it provided "solace".

"It's so important that we name those people who have died and we give their families that opportunity to come together and to remember," he said.

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