Man’s fury after National Highways close A49 at Woofferton

Chris Ham, who lives in Little Hereford, said "chaos" was brought onto the local community on Friday (October 24) after the A49 closed at Woofferton following a lorry crash which caused a fuel spillage. The incident, which happened in the early hours of the morning, prompted not only an emergency service response, but also saw the A49 close between the A4117 near Ludlow and the A456 near Ashford Bowdler. Mr Ham argues that the chaos caused by the diversion could have been avoided if National Highways had cleaned up the spillage, rather than resurfacing part of the busy trunk road.

He believes the "chaos to the local community and the economic loss could all have been avoided" if some traffic had been allowed to pass through the major A-road. "It could easily be coned off to allow traffic to pass on restricted carriageways, and the A49 could be reopened," he said, "If the spill had been washed off in the early morning the tarmac would not have been damaged even if it is now.

"The road could have been opened on restricted speed." Mr Ham claims the number of cars and heavy vehicles using Lynch Lane as a diversion route has caused significant damage to the verges and ditches along the narrow carriageway. A spokesperson for National Highways said: "We only close our roads when absolutely necessary as we appreciate how disruptive this can be.

But safety has to be our number one priority at all times. "In this instance, three quarters of a tank of fuel was spilled onto the road surface stretching across some 300m of carriageway. This caused severe damage to the carriageway and the only option was for the road to be resurfaced.

"We worked as quickly as possible with our specialist teams to deal with this unforeseen incident and opened the road as soon as it was safe to do so."