Meopham dad slams Kent Police after son knocked off motorbike on A2 between Gravesend and Bean
A motorcyclist who was knocked off a notorious A-road was "seconds away" from being run over and killed, his father has said. Charlie McPherson was left needing surgery on a broken arm after a car changing lanes hit his bike off balance and launched him across the road.
It happened at around 7.15am between Gravesend and Bean on April 1. As a result, the 20-year-old was left with possible life-changing injuries, according to his dad Andy McPherson, and has missed out on work with UEFA, where the youngster works on the advertising boards.
Charlie, who also works as a plumber with his dad, was filtering through traffic when a car started to move from the fourth lane into the third and clipped his motorbike. Footage of the crash shows the youngster, from Meopham, flung across the road, with oncoming cars moving out of the way. "If it were a second or two earlier, he would have been run over and killed," 49-year-old Andy said.
The father-of-two has hit out at Kent Police for their investigation after the incident, claiming they took more than a week to get in touch and the driver of the car walked away with just a talking to.
He added: "Next time, he could kill someone. If that crash had happened on another day he might have been run over by another car. Charlie was seconds away from death.
"But the main thing is that he's still here and alive."
Andy was riding ahead of Charlie on their way to London when he looked in his mirrors and saw traffic stopping. He turned around and headed down the hard shoulder to find his son on the floor with a member of the public who had got out and sat with him. "It was horrific," the shocked father said. "I can't explain the feeling.
It was a really worrying time." "Police told us they weren't prosecuting the driver as dashcam from a Tesco lorry made it look like Charlie clipped the driver's wing mirror, but we had dashcam from another driver behind the collision which shows the car moving out." Andy said he was "dumbfounded" that no action was taken against the driver.
He said: "It was dangerous driving. He could have killed someone that day. "You see that happen every day.
It's one of the most dangerous roads in the south of England. The standards of driving have dropped, they're shocking now." A police spokesman said: "We were called to a report of a collision involving a car and a motorbike on the A2 London-bound near to Pepperhill at 7.13am on Wednesday, April 1.
Emergency services attended and a man was taken to hospital with injuries.
Picture: Andy McPherson
Picture: Andy McPherson
"In the days that have followed, specially trained officers from Kent Police's Roads Policing Unit have explored all available lines of inquiry and are keen to speak to anyone who may have information about the collision who has not yet got in touch.
"At the moment, there have been no arrests, but all involved parties have been kept up to date with the progress of the investigation which remains open at this time."
Witnesses can contact Kent Police on 01474 366149 quoting 01- 208.