Witnesses spotted driver

jumping red traffic lights

and speeding through city

POLICE were carrying out tests on a car wreck yesterday after a driver

and two teenage female passengers died in a crash.

Reports suggested the car may have been travelling at speeds up to

70mph before it hit a tree in a built-up area.

At the time of the crash, police had just started trying to trace the

Fiesta after reports that it had been seen being driven dangerously.

Less than 20 minutes earlier, a member of the public complained that

the car had jumped a red light in the city.

It was also reported to have clipped the wing mirror of a car it was

overtaking on a stretch of dual carriageway.

A lookout for the Fiesta was circulated to police patrols, but it

crashed before it was spotted.

Driver Phillip Matthew, 23, of King's Court, Tillydrone, Aberdeen, who

was showing off the car he had got earlier that day, was killed. His

girlfriend, Lindsay Thomson, 19, and her friend, Lorna Carmichael, 18,

also died in their seats.

Yesterday, Miss Carmichael's father told how his daughter had been

picked up by her two friends to go for a drive.

''It looks like they were all out for a spin together,'' said Mr Don

Carmichael. ''The last time we saw Lorna was at 8.30am when she left for

work.

''Then the police came round in the early hours to tell us what had

happened. ''We asked to be taken to the scene.'' The Fiesta was just

wrapped round the tree.

Miss Carmichael lived with her parents and her two sisters, Yvonne,

25, and Lynn, 22, at Pittengullies Circle, Peterculter, near Aberdeen.

Mr Carmichael said: ''We had just come back from a holiday in Malta

together.

''Lorna was a lively, vivacious girl who loved life and lived it to

the full. She was always outrageously dressed, like a gipsy.''

He added: ''What has happened is painful and so unfortunate, but you

cannot mollycoddle your kids. The one thing this will teach me to do is

to drive slowly, that is certain.''

The family of Lindsay Thomson, of Gaitside Drive, Aberdeen, whose

father died of cancer a year ago, were too upset to talk yesterday.

The parents of Philip Matthew were told of the tragedy while they were

on holiday in Tenerife. Arrangements were made for them to fly back

immediately.

The accident happened on Mid Stocket Road, a long straight downhill

road running from the ring road into the city centre.

A single posy of flowers yesterday marked the spot of the tragedy.

Mr Carmichael said later that he and his wife had agreed to give their

daughter's eyes for transplant.

''It was too late for the hospital to use her other organs,''

explained Mr Carmichael.

''Although she did not have a donor card, we know it is what Lorna

would have wanted.''