M60 car fire road closure and M61 bridge crash delays

Just before 11am, a car caught fire on the M60 clockwise hard shoulder near J13 (Worsley), requiring all lanes to be closed as emergency services attended. Around the same time, an HGV lorry struck a bridge on the M61 Southbound between J2 A580 East Lancashire Road to J1 M60 J15, requiring services to attend the scene, clear up rubble, and perform emergency repairs. A National Highways[1] spokesperson said: "Lanes one, two, and three (of four) are closed on the M61 southbound junction one to two after a lorry struck an overbridge.

Image of the M61 showing significant traffic after a vehicle crashed into a bridge (Image: National Highways) "Greater Manchester Police and National Highways Traffic Officers are on scene with traffic management in place while debris is cleared and the bridge is inspected. "We received reports of a vehicle fire just before 11am on the hard shoulder of the M60 near junction 13.

"National Highways and emergency services attended. "The fire was put out, and the driver was taken to hospital as a precaution." There were no injuries reported after the M61 bridge incident.

The driver involved in the M60 fire incident was taken to hospital as a precaution, but a Northwest Ambulance Service spokesperson has since confirmed that 'nobody needed hospital treatment'. Officers responded to the M61 bridge crash after receiving reports of 'rubble, rocks, and concrete in the road', believed to have come off the back of the HGV. Traffic on the M61 between junctions one and two following the HGV bridge crash (Image: National highawys)

Road sweepers and maintenance teams were sent to clear debris and assess the safety of the bridge. Delays were in place on both roads[2] for several hours until traffic returned to normal. All four lanes on both the M60 and M61 were initially closed as clean-up was undertaken.

The M60 remained at a total standstill until around 12.10pm, when lanes were reopened to ease congestion. But all four lanes were re-closed only ten minutes later as ambulances arrived at the scene. By around 12.50pm the M61 was back to normal, with all four lanes open and drivers no longer expected to encounter repairs.

Delays lingered slightly longer on the M60as repair work had to be carried out following the incident, meaning lane one remained closed until around 1pm.

There were still slight delays by 1.30pm, but by this point, all lanes were open.

References

1. ^ National Highways (www.theboltonnews.co.uk)
2. ^ roads (www.theboltonnews.co.uk)