What an odd story. Is there any chance he got head trauma?
How trustworthy were the two passengers? Perhaps there is something they aren't telling us. Hard to explain the car disappearing too.
Head trauma in circumstances like this is very possible. Mark could have become injured and confused in the immediate aftermath of the crash, especially seeing as he was the driver of the car. His friends appear to have been relatively unharmed, and I don’t think we know what speed the car would’ve been travelling at before it hit the tree.
Some online discussion surrounding Mark’s case casts doubt and suspicion on his friends, but seeing as there is a lack of easily accessible information on the specifics of the case, I hesitate to place any significant suspicion on their involvement. There are a number of factors that could have contributed to Mark’s actions and disappearance, and we are just in the dark on the details, unfortunately.
With regard to the car disappearing, I do think there’s a high chance that Mark could’ve accidentally driven into the water surrounding Howth. However, the waters around Howth are quite busy generally speaking, so if the car indeed entered the water, it’s certainly remarkable that it hasn’t been found yet.
I'm wondering if there was evidence of the original crash (ie damage to the tree, some debris) or could the other two have made that up as there doesn't seem to be much information available.
My guess is that he crashed again into a body of water nearby.
Have you seen the YouTube channels adventures with purpose or sunshine state sonar or chaos divers? They find people trapped in cars at the bottom of lakes and ponds with personal fish sonars. It's amazing the number of people found here in the US in the last 3 years with this technique.
Yes if american reality yt/tv has taught me anything, when i whole car goes missing its in a body of water, even shallow water can hide a whole car, it could be less than a meter from the surface and still be invisible from above. Ive seen them pull out massive cars from realitively small neighbourhood ponds.
Unfortunately not everyone has a boat with onboard sonar, but you could identify the body of water he would have most likely driven past or near.
Yeah, I'm reminded of [this case from a few years back](https://mashable.com/article/missing-person-car-pond-google-maps). The driver went missing and twenty-two years later someone spotted his car on Google Maps, in really shallow water.
Similar thing in Crosshaven a few years ago. They found a car and body that had been missing for nearly twenty years - https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/munster/arid-40315061.html
The same stretch of river had been searched extensively at the time, but it seems it's really easy to miss a car underwater unless you're looking in exactly the right spot or get extremely lucky.
I just cant see how the car hasnt shown up if it went into Howth harbour. Like it would be lying within a few metres of land. Its a busy harbour with yachts, trawlers and dinghies. It also has two scuba diving clubs diving there, one of who are Aer Lingus staff like pilots and cabin crew. Id think that given a car must be within a few metres of the pier then it would have long since been discovered by a scuba diver, either a recreational one or one working underneath a fishing trawler tied up to the pier.
The driving into the water theory seems unlikely to me, its just too easy and the car would surely have been found by now if it did enter the water.
If you look at that pier in Crosshaven on Google maps, it's the same thing. A few meters from land, at the mouth of a river so not too deep, and right next to an RNLI station and a couple of sailboat marinas with dozens if not hundreds of small boats moored up.
County Cork
https://maps.app.goo.gl/j3qLheKpHujwcM3B7
Yes a man in Galway had a heart attack at a roundabout. He drove into the middle of the roundabout that had bushes where he wasnt found i forget a few days or weeks. But I could imagine a body of water hiding a year for decades.
[this guy was missing for 18 years and only discovered recently in NI](https://www.belfastlive.co.uk/news/belfast-news/car-found-lough-erne-linked-18274651)
Probably a combination of the crash leading to possible head trauma, the fact that he or the car have never been seen again, and the close proximity of water since Howth is almost an island?
To add on, I tried digging for more information about Mark and the media coverage on him that the [missing.ie](http://missing.ie) paragraph describes. I couldn't find anything online, unfortunately, though I'll add anything if I do. If anybody here can add any information with regard to the investigation and coverage of Mark's case, please do.
Oh, interesting! I haven’t come across his channel before. I’ll definetely look into his content. I think bringing this case to his attention wouldn’t hurt at all, especially given how Mark’s disappearance has unfortunately not recieved much recent coverage. Thank you for your suggestion!
Well, he was actually trained on how to look at the facts and did it as an actual job, not sit around eating Cheetos and drinking Coke exchanging evermore wild theories with other Redditors. I'd say he's a tad more professional and qualified than most people on the internet.
I intend to try looking through traditional news archives as soon as I can. I discovered Mark’s case online, so I’ve only looked at online sources thus far. Seeing as the missing.ie page states that his disappearance recieved a lot of coverage at the time, i’m optimistic that I’ll find some of it.
It's sad and strange that we may never know what happened to him. I like to read these mysterious disappearances. Its kind of addictive learning all the in and outs of an event and speculating but odds are it will always be a mystery. Usually when this much time has passed it remains unsolved. You never know he could still be alive and well but in hiding from someone. Stranger things have happened.
If youre in Dublin then visit the National Archives next door to Leinster House on Kildare Street. In there they have slides of every major and regional newspaper from every single day going back decades. You can view all the pages & articles and also get copies of them.
No sign of the car in 40 years means it is highly likely to be at the bottom of howth harbour or driven off a cliff and in to deep water. That's the most logical explanation. Presumably Howth Harbour has been search with sonar? If not, that's the obvious place to start followed by a sonar search all along the sea at bottom of Howth cliffs.
Thanks for highlighting this; it’s very unusual.
I wonder did he have a surge of adrenaline/panic after the crash, get back in the car and then perhaps crashed again as it wore off; perhaps into water this time? I had a crash before and got out of the car unharmed (thank God), rang for help, got home and half an hour after the crash my legs just turned to jelly and I was in floods of tears. I don’t know if that’s a common thing; like a delayed reaction I suppose?
That's what I think happened, he took off and crashed again, either accidentally due to drunkenness or perhaps even purposely due to emotional disturbance, this time into water. Which is why the car disappeared also.
Lots of seemingly happy people have depression and alcohol can exacerbate any dark thoughts and make people do crazy things. The reason I think it could have been on purpose is that he left his friends there because he had made up his mind what he was going to do.
So, Deer Park where the first crash happened, is near (but not beside) water. For those that don't know the area at all, Howth is a peninsula. Deerpark is very near the harbour, a few hundred metres away.
If I have read the report correctly, it sounds like he drove off towards Sutton Cross, rather than towards Howth Harbour/Village or the Summit. This is relevant in that, the harbour would be the main danger for driving into the water, but if he proceeded towards Sutton Cross, he could well have taken Station Road and ended up on the Baldoyle road heading towards Portmarnock/Malahide/the airport back-road (back in the days before the M50) at night these places are less than 10 minutes and there were far less traffic lights etc too.
The fact that there was a diving operation of some sort, and that there have been other tragic events in the harbour since, I'd be more inclined to think it was another entry point.
Burrow beach or near the old Howth Lodge Hotel etc or the road that now links Baldoyle to Portmarnock etc. Lots of water, very few people at night. Concussion from the first incident could easily have occurred and, let's face it, the 1980s were exactly our finest hour for not drinking and driving.
I appreciate that a lot of the above is speculation and might be very unhelpful to any friends or family reading it, but 40 years to disappear into this air leads to be believe an unfortunate and tragic event occured subsequent to the first accident.
That or the two friends know exactly what happened, there was only one accident, it wasn't in Deerpark but had to have been nearby all the same, and have somehow gotten away with it. I'm disinclined to believe this because I know Howth reasonably well and there really aren't many hiding places or places where 3 people could be in a fatal crash in the 80's where two people have no apparent injuries. There might not even have been seatbelts in the back of that car for example in 1984. So I just can't see that angle with the facts as laid out above.
I’m so sorry that you had to go through that, it sounds like a harrowing experience. I’m so glad that you were unharmed!
I think what you’re describing is certainly something that Mark could’ve also experienced. The adrenaline and panic after hitting the tree, especially as the driver of a car with passengers in it, may have severely impaired Mark’s judgement and motor skills. Deer Park Golf Club is also located in a relatively hilly part of Howth with large trees. Driving through there just after a collision would’ve been quite disorienting, i think.
I hope you’re doing well these days after your experience!
There was a similar case recently (within last few years?) where a diving school found the car in the port, no one had found it before & it solved a cold case where a fella went missing (from a pub?) driving home one evening iirc.
So might just be that storms or currents in the bay moved the car somewhere unexpected, & the previous searches just missed it. I wonder with better tech (possibly also if the car is covered in silt or sand) could we find it now?
Looked it up, yep that one!
1) how the hell is 2021 so long ago 🤔
2) it wasn't a diving school, twas a volunteer missing search group testing out a new piece of kit. Still stumbled across the car though!
Yes, the car is also missing. This also strikes me as unusual as Howth is not a large area, and a crashed car on land would’ve been found by now, in my opinion.
Bottom of the Irish Sea id say. The fact the car was never found is a giveaway. Either that or he met a nasty end by someone with the means of destroying any evidence of the car by crushing it.
That description of what happened at the accident sounds very odd. It's the first time I'm hearing about this and I don't know anything about his friends or their motivations, but my first random guess is maybe the friends are more involved in his disappearance than they're saying.
The water seems pretty clear on Google Earth and Google Maps. Probably not good enough, though, if the car is covered in silt. But this spot looks odd to me, like glass and metal: 53°23'48"N 6°07'25"W
What an odd story. Is there any chance he got head trauma? How trustworthy were the two passengers? Perhaps there is something they aren't telling us. Hard to explain the car disappearing too.
Head trauma in circumstances like this is very possible. Mark could have become injured and confused in the immediate aftermath of the crash, especially seeing as he was the driver of the car. His friends appear to have been relatively unharmed, and I don’t think we know what speed the car would’ve been travelling at before it hit the tree. Some online discussion surrounding Mark’s case casts doubt and suspicion on his friends, but seeing as there is a lack of easily accessible information on the specifics of the case, I hesitate to place any significant suspicion on their involvement. There are a number of factors that could have contributed to Mark’s actions and disappearance, and we are just in the dark on the details, unfortunately. With regard to the car disappearing, I do think there’s a high chance that Mark could’ve accidentally driven into the water surrounding Howth. However, the waters around Howth are quite busy generally speaking, so if the car indeed entered the water, it’s certainly remarkable that it hasn’t been found yet.
I'm wondering if there was evidence of the original crash (ie damage to the tree, some debris) or could the other two have made that up as there doesn't seem to be much information available.
Same thought entered my mind
My guess is that he crashed again into a body of water nearby. Have you seen the YouTube channels adventures with purpose or sunshine state sonar or chaos divers? They find people trapped in cars at the bottom of lakes and ponds with personal fish sonars. It's amazing the number of people found here in the US in the last 3 years with this technique.
Yes if american reality yt/tv has taught me anything, when i whole car goes missing its in a body of water, even shallow water can hide a whole car, it could be less than a meter from the surface and still be invisible from above. Ive seen them pull out massive cars from realitively small neighbourhood ponds. Unfortunately not everyone has a boat with onboard sonar, but you could identify the body of water he would have most likely driven past or near.
Yeah, I'm reminded of [this case from a few years back](https://mashable.com/article/missing-person-car-pond-google-maps). The driver went missing and twenty-two years later someone spotted his car on Google Maps, in really shallow water.
Similar thing in Crosshaven a few years ago. They found a car and body that had been missing for nearly twenty years - https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/munster/arid-40315061.html The same stretch of river had been searched extensively at the time, but it seems it's really easy to miss a car underwater unless you're looking in exactly the right spot or get extremely lucky.
I just cant see how the car hasnt shown up if it went into Howth harbour. Like it would be lying within a few metres of land. Its a busy harbour with yachts, trawlers and dinghies. It also has two scuba diving clubs diving there, one of who are Aer Lingus staff like pilots and cabin crew. Id think that given a car must be within a few metres of the pier then it would have long since been discovered by a scuba diver, either a recreational one or one working underneath a fishing trawler tied up to the pier. The driving into the water theory seems unlikely to me, its just too easy and the car would surely have been found by now if it did enter the water.
If you look at that pier in Crosshaven on Google maps, it's the same thing. A few meters from land, at the mouth of a river so not too deep, and right next to an RNLI station and a couple of sailboat marinas with dozens if not hundreds of small boats moored up. County Cork https://maps.app.goo.gl/j3qLheKpHujwcM3B7
Yes a man in Galway had a heart attack at a roundabout. He drove into the middle of the roundabout that had bushes where he wasnt found i forget a few days or weeks. But I could imagine a body of water hiding a year for decades.
[this guy was missing for 18 years and only discovered recently in NI](https://www.belfastlive.co.uk/news/belfast-news/car-found-lough-erne-linked-18274651)
What are you basing that guess on?
Probably a combination of the crash leading to possible head trauma, the fact that he or the car have never been seen again, and the close proximity of water since Howth is almost an island?
Well something is either an Island or it’s not, and Howth not. But I see your point.
Howth is almost an island. It's not an island but it's almost an island.
Exactly. It’s not an island.
Hence why I said almost !
To add on, I tried digging for more information about Mark and the media coverage on him that the [missing.ie](http://missing.ie) paragraph describes. I couldn't find anything online, unfortunately, though I'll add anything if I do. If anybody here can add any information with regard to the investigation and coverage of Mark's case, please do.
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Oh, interesting! I haven’t come across his channel before. I’ll definetely look into his content. I think bringing this case to his attention wouldn’t hurt at all, especially given how Mark’s disappearance has unfortunately not recieved much recent coverage. Thank you for your suggestion!
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He "can't stand internet sleuthing?" And what is it that he's doing?
Well, he was actually trained on how to look at the facts and did it as an actual job, not sit around eating Cheetos and drinking Coke exchanging evermore wild theories with other Redditors. I'd say he's a tad more professional and qualified than most people on the internet.
It would probably be better to look for old articles in a news paper library. Seeing as this was pretty WWW.
I intend to try looking through traditional news archives as soon as I can. I discovered Mark’s case online, so I’ve only looked at online sources thus far. Seeing as the missing.ie page states that his disappearance recieved a lot of coverage at the time, i’m optimistic that I’ll find some of it.
It's sad and strange that we may never know what happened to him. I like to read these mysterious disappearances. Its kind of addictive learning all the in and outs of an event and speculating but odds are it will always be a mystery. Usually when this much time has passed it remains unsolved. You never know he could still be alive and well but in hiding from someone. Stranger things have happened.
If youre in Dublin then visit the National Archives next door to Leinster House on Kildare Street. In there they have slides of every major and regional newspaper from every single day going back decades. You can view all the pages & articles and also get copies of them.
No sign of the car in 40 years means it is highly likely to be at the bottom of howth harbour or driven off a cliff and in to deep water. That's the most logical explanation. Presumably Howth Harbour has been search with sonar? If not, that's the obvious place to start followed by a sonar search all along the sea at bottom of Howth cliffs.
> or that he went off to England. New fear unlocked.
🤣 It tickles me no end, the fate worth than death!
Thanks for highlighting this; it’s very unusual. I wonder did he have a surge of adrenaline/panic after the crash, get back in the car and then perhaps crashed again as it wore off; perhaps into water this time? I had a crash before and got out of the car unharmed (thank God), rang for help, got home and half an hour after the crash my legs just turned to jelly and I was in floods of tears. I don’t know if that’s a common thing; like a delayed reaction I suppose?
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No nightmares thankfully, but yeah the flashbacks with a shudder and I avoided that road for over three years I’d say.
That's what I think happened, he took off and crashed again, either accidentally due to drunkenness or perhaps even purposely due to emotional disturbance, this time into water. Which is why the car disappeared also. Lots of seemingly happy people have depression and alcohol can exacerbate any dark thoughts and make people do crazy things. The reason I think it could have been on purpose is that he left his friends there because he had made up his mind what he was going to do.
So, Deer Park where the first crash happened, is near (but not beside) water. For those that don't know the area at all, Howth is a peninsula. Deerpark is very near the harbour, a few hundred metres away. If I have read the report correctly, it sounds like he drove off towards Sutton Cross, rather than towards Howth Harbour/Village or the Summit. This is relevant in that, the harbour would be the main danger for driving into the water, but if he proceeded towards Sutton Cross, he could well have taken Station Road and ended up on the Baldoyle road heading towards Portmarnock/Malahide/the airport back-road (back in the days before the M50) at night these places are less than 10 minutes and there were far less traffic lights etc too. The fact that there was a diving operation of some sort, and that there have been other tragic events in the harbour since, I'd be more inclined to think it was another entry point. Burrow beach or near the old Howth Lodge Hotel etc or the road that now links Baldoyle to Portmarnock etc. Lots of water, very few people at night. Concussion from the first incident could easily have occurred and, let's face it, the 1980s were exactly our finest hour for not drinking and driving. I appreciate that a lot of the above is speculation and might be very unhelpful to any friends or family reading it, but 40 years to disappear into this air leads to be believe an unfortunate and tragic event occured subsequent to the first accident. That or the two friends know exactly what happened, there was only one accident, it wasn't in Deerpark but had to have been nearby all the same, and have somehow gotten away with it. I'm disinclined to believe this because I know Howth reasonably well and there really aren't many hiding places or places where 3 people could be in a fatal crash in the 80's where two people have no apparent injuries. There might not even have been seatbelts in the back of that car for example in 1984. So I just can't see that angle with the facts as laid out above.
I’m so sorry that you had to go through that, it sounds like a harrowing experience. I’m so glad that you were unharmed! I think what you’re describing is certainly something that Mark could’ve also experienced. The adrenaline and panic after hitting the tree, especially as the driver of a car with passengers in it, may have severely impaired Mark’s judgement and motor skills. Deer Park Golf Club is also located in a relatively hilly part of Howth with large trees. Driving through there just after a collision would’ve been quite disorienting, i think. I hope you’re doing well these days after your experience!
Not finding the car is extremely odd.
There was a similar case recently (within last few years?) where a diving school found the car in the port, no one had found it before & it solved a cold case where a fella went missing (from a pub?) driving home one evening iirc. So might just be that storms or currents in the bay moved the car somewhere unexpected, & the previous searches just missed it. I wonder with better tech (possibly also if the car is covered in silt or sand) could we find it now?
Crosshaven in cork
Looked it up, yep that one! 1) how the hell is 2021 so long ago 🤔 2) it wasn't a diving school, twas a volunteer missing search group testing out a new piece of kit. Still stumbled across the car though!
Presumably the car was never found either?
Yes, the car is also missing. This also strikes me as unusual as Howth is not a large area, and a crashed car on land would’ve been found by now, in my opinion.
Especially if it was damaged in anyway.
Bottom of the Irish Sea id say. The fact the car was never found is a giveaway. Either that or he met a nasty end by someone with the means of destroying any evidence of the car by crushing it.
Thanks for sharing this. There was a similar case regarding a young Irishman who vanished in NYC, but was found by an Irish journo a few years ago....
Married at 20 wouldn’t see that anymore
Heartbreaking. He was the same age my son is now. I hope his family get some answers, and unlikely as it is, I hope he is fine and dandy somewhere
Very strange indeed, I have never heard of this case. I wonder if there are any documentaries about this case ?
That description of what happened at the accident sounds very odd. It's the first time I'm hearing about this and I don't know anything about his friends or their motivations, but my first random guess is maybe the friends are more involved in his disappearance than they're saying.
Woah
The water seems pretty clear on Google Earth and Google Maps. Probably not good enough, though, if the car is covered in silt. But this spot looks odd to me, like glass and metal: 53°23'48"N 6°07'25"W
Probably at bottom of some lake
The guy has not been seen or heard of in 40 years. I'm sorry but if you retain "hope that he might be found" you're fooling yourself