Traffic chaos at the double

The drilling rig’s giant tracks sink into the road

TWO accidents within minutes brought traffic gridlock to Shaw.

A collision involving two HGVs and a car on the Jubilee bends closed Milnrow Road between Shaw and Newhey at around 3.30pm.

But an alternative route on Huddersfield Road at Newhey was also closed when a 50-tonne drilling rig caused a road collapse just before Ogden village.

The road was still closed this morning.

At the Jubilee bends, police said a collision between an HGV and Corsa car led to a second HGV swerving and shedding some of its load of timber.

Firemen helped paramedics to lift an injured man from the car, and clear debris and oil from the road, which reopened around 5.40pm. He was taken to hospital with minor injuries.

Traffic was backed up in Shaw and Milnrow, leading to queues at the M62 junction 21.

The drilling rig was working on an old retaining wall by the side of a stream when the carriageway collapsed beneath it.

The road, which links Newhey and Denshaw, was closed on both sides, near the Clough Manor Hotel at Denshaw and just beyond Newhey village centre.

A spokesman for contractors Askam at the scene of the collapse said the rig was drilling down nine metres to insert steel rods to support the banking before the old wall was pulled down and rebuilt.