A39 Somerset: Double-decker bus carrying 70 people overturns

A double-decker bus carrying 70 Hinkley Point C workers overturned in icy road conditions in Somerset.

Police attended the crash, which was declared a major incident, and also involved a motorcyclist, on the A39 near Cannington at about 06:00 GMT.

There were 70 people on the bus and 54 patients were treated at the scene, but there were no fatalities, a spokeswoman for Avon and Somerset Police said.

Bridgwater MP Ian Liddell-Grainger said three had significant injuries.

A spokeswoman for Avon and Somerset Police said 26 of the 54 patients were “walking wounded” and are being treated at Bridgwater minor injury unit and Southmead Hospital in Bristol.

The force confirmed it was no longer treating the crash as a major incident shortly after noon.

The crash site is about eight miles away from the nuclear power station, which is currently under construction.

A spokesman for Hinkley Point said: “Emergency services are on the scene and travel to and from the site has been suspended.”

The power plant has not yet commented on how many workers were involved or the number of injuries.

Charis Ware, 45, who lives close to the scene of the crash, told BBC West she was woken by “banging, shouting and horns blowing and screaming”.

She said she had counted at least 20 emergency service vehicles at the scene.

“All I could hear was noise, lots of shouting,” Ms Ware said.

“This is quite a busy road and we do have regular accidents but this one being quite a serious incident shook us all.”

Avon and Somerset Police say 53 crashes were reported on Monday evening.

Police said a further 67 calls were received for other road-related incidents, between 18:00 and 23:00 on Monday, taking the total number of reports to more than 100 in five hours.

“The conditions are extremely icy and dangerous due to the freezing conditions overnight and residual water on the road from the past week’s wet weather,” a spokesperson for police said.

Seven of these incidents were reported to have resulted in injuries, but they are not thought to be serious.

Mr Liddell-Grainger said: “Obviously it was a terrifying experience for everyone on that bus and my thoughts are with them and their families.

“But we absolutely must get to the bottom of why this crash occurred because EDF is very conscious of the need to maintain the highest safety standards for the protection of their workers – and that concern naturally extends to those periods when they are being transferred to and from the site.

“I am aware police have been reporting a high number of accidents in the area this morning, all of them blamed on icy road conditions.

“We need to establish as soon as we can whether similar circumstances played a role in this particular event.”

The bus is on its left-hand side, about 300 yards away from the roundabout heading towards Bridgwater.

It is currently half on the bank, half in the hedge. There are seven or eight accident investigation people and police looking around the axles, climbing around and checking it out.

The police are on the roundabout, stopping any traffic coming through. There is lots of traffic, Wembdon Hill is very busy, because they are being diverted through the village, and police are not letting anyone through.

We are only able to take pictures from behind the cordon, at the closure. There are a couple of police vehicles near the bus, doing checks.

It is very, very busy in the area – all of the Hinkley Point lorries, and others, are having to divert through Wembdon.

A Met Office yellow warning for ice across central areas of the UK is in place, as temperatures reached a low of -2C in Somerset last night.

“We have seen a significantly higher number of road-related collisions and incidents in the past 12 hours, which has increased the demand on police resources,” added Supt Runacres.

A significant number of police, fire and ambulance units are at the scene of the A39.

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