Motorist 'almost killed' after car drives down wrong…

Motorist 'almost killed' after car drives down wrong side of Irish motorway as gardai investigate

A motorist has claimed he was 'almost killed' when a car driving in the wrong direction on the motorway suddenly appeared in front of him.

He was driving in the right-hand 'fast' lane on the M3 motorway in Meath when an oncoming car approached him head on.

He was unable to move into the left-hand lane as the car came straight towards him because there was a truck in the lane next to him. Luckily, the quick-thinking driver was able to swerve right as there was a 'hard shoulder' space that opened up next to the concrete barrier to his right.

The incident allegedly happened on Thursday, November 10 on the M3 motorway in Meath near Junction 6, the exit for Dunshaughlin.

Following the harrowing incident, the driver called the guards to report the dangerous driving and also took to Reddit to express his shock.

He wrote in a post on Reddit Ireland: "Someone driving the wrong way on m3 almost killed me."

"Just heading home from work. I was driving in the right lane and I noticed a f***ing car was coming right towards me. I was lucky enough that there was a hard shoulder to the right as there was a truck to my left.

"So I just did a little skid and everything was grand. But honestly in shock right now. Really hope he doesn't cause an accident. I rang the gaurds. So hopefully the b*****d will be caught soon. F***ing hell. I was finishing a night shift. Certaintly won't be going to bed now."

A video of the near-miss appeared on a separate Reddit post days later showing a car driving the wrong way down the motorway for miles. The location was mistakenly labelled as the M1 in the post but people were quick to correct in the comments with one person writing: "It's 100% the M3 southbound between J7 & J6."

The clip appears to have been filmed by a person in a car on the opposite side of the M3 and shows the car driving in the wrong direction for over 2 minutes. The shocked cameraman can be heard screaming at the driver going in the wrong direction as he thinks he is going to witness a terrible crash.

As he watches the car approaching oncoming traffic head on, he can be heard screaming: "What? What's he doing? He's dead. He's dead. He's in the fast lane and all, what's he doing?"

Many people took to the comments of the video, with one person writing: "Christ, I just kept waiting for the smash. See [nothing] on the news pages, so I'm guessing it ended without major incident."

Another said: "Imagine coming around a motorway bend at 120 Km/h and seeing another car coming straight at you!"

The video was then linked back to the motorist who had the lucky escape who said he believed it caught his close shave with death on camera.

"I am nearly certain that is me early on in the video when the lad screams he's dead," he replied. "Cause that's the same shape of my car. And if memory serves me right, there was two trucks when i see them. Thanks for sending me this."

Gardai confirmed they were looking into an incident had been reported on the M3 on the same day.

A garda spokesperson said: "Gardaí received reports of an alleged incident that reportedly occurred on the M3 in Navan, County Meath, on the morning of Thursday, 10th November, 2022.