Nottingham road delays: Lorry with digger hits bridge

The crash caused debris to fall from the bridge

A man has described how he narrowly avoided being crushed when a lorry carrying a digger crashed into a bridge in front of him.

Liam Olver, 21, said he suspected the digger was too high to clear the bridge in Nottingham, so he slowed down.

The digger then tipped off the lorry and he was so shocked he sat clutching his steering wheel for five minutes.

The crash happened at about 8:00 BST on Middleton Boulevard and has caused major disruption all day.

Mr Olver, 21, said it had left him "shaken up".

Liam Olver took this photo after he stopped his car, turned his engine off and put his hazard warning lights on

"The digger was on the back of the lorry and I thought, 'that's a bit high', so I eased off the accelerator to give myself a bit of space and the next moment it fell off," he said.

"If I was any closer to the lorry it would have landed on me, and a digger on top of a Corsa is not going to end very well. Luckily it didn't get a scrape on it."

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Mr Olver lives in Ripley in Derbyshire but drives that way every day as he works at a car dealership in Nottingham.

"It was an unexpected journey to work, let's put it that way," he said.

Police have advised people to stay clear of the area, which is part of a busy ring road and also near to the Queen's Medical Centre.

The hospital said the crash was likely to affect all traffic heading there.

Bus company Nottingham City Transport said there had been "severe delays" for some of its services, with many buses not moving for about 25 minutes.

A crane is being brought in to remove the digger from the road

The crash has also been causing problems for people heading to and from Derby on the nearby A52, with long queues of traffic.

The southbound carriageway of Middleton Boulevard was closed all morning with a diversion along Triumph Road and Derby Road.

The road has been closed in both directions from 13:30 BST so that a crane could be brought in to remove the digger, which is expected to take two hours.

After the road has been cleared the surface will be assessed and repaired if necessary.

"We will endeavour to get the road re-opened in time for evening peak if it is safe to do so," Nottingham City Council said in a statement.

"However, we advise people to allow more time for their journeys and to consider alternative routes to the ring road if possible."