"I had no idea what was going on."

The 43-year-old actor said he was forced to miss out on a trip to Donegal with his four best friends because he had to attend a three-day sailing competition in Scotland at the same time.

On August 13, 1999, Jamie arrived back home from his trip when he was met at the door by his dad and sister Jess, both in tears.

"At the time, hardly anyone had mobiles, and I had no idea what was going on," Dornan explained, per Extra.ie.

His father and sister then went on to tell Jamie, then merely a teenager, that four of his best friends, Chris Hannah, Chris Sloan, Nick Kirkwood and David Armstrong, had been killed in a head-on collision with another car.

The four friends were travelling to a holiday home in Portnoo. Three of them died at the scene, and the fourth teenager was pronounced dead upon his arrival at Letterkenny General Hospital.

Two women in their 40s and a child were also critically injured.

The headmaster of the local Methodist College, Wilfred Mulryne, said at the time that everybody at the school felt devastated.