A12 reopens after fatal biker crash

Tuesday, January 29, 2008
10:40 PM

A MALE motorcyclist has been killed today following an accident on the southbound carriageway of the A12.

A MALE motorcyclist has been killed today following an accident on the southbound carriageway of the A12.

The carriageway was closed for eight hours before finally re-opening tonight just after 10pm.

Thousands of motorists heading south faced lengthy delays with diversions in place.

The A137 was heavily backed up with traffic from Ipswich into Essex. At one point queues stretched right back to the ski slope heading out of town.

One driver from Manningtree said: “The traffic is horrendous. It has taken me two hours to do a 20 minute journey.”

There were also reports of grid locked traffic in Dedham and East Bergholt.

David Jones, landlord of the Hare and Hounds, East Bergholt, said traffic was heavy outside his pub from 3.30pm and into the evening. “It was just heavy stationary traffic and it would move a little bit and then stop.”

Traffic was being diverted off the A12 at Cutlers Lane and finally feed back on at the Stratford junction.

The problem was also worsened by local and Plymouth football fans leaving Portman Road after the final whistle.

The air ambulance was scrambled to the scene of the crash, which happened just before 2.30pm, close to the B1068 turnoff for East Bergholt.

A spokeswoman for Suffolk police said it involved a Vauxhall Corsa car and a Kawasaki motorbike. She said the male rider of the motorbike, who has not been named, was pronounced dead at the scene shortly before 3.30pm.

A spokeswoman for the East of England Ambulance Service said they were alerted to the accident by an off duty ambulance technician.

“It looks as if he saw the scene, stopped, and then called in the notification,” she said.

A spokesperson for Suffolk Police said last night they were doing all they could to alleviate the traffic problems and open the A12 as soon as possible.

This latest fatality brings the total of road deaths in Suffolk this month to four. Samuel Fordham, 28, and Darren Welton, 20, were both killed in a car accident in north Suffolk last Wednesday and pensioner Valerie Lambert, 75, from Halstead, also lost her life in an accident in Newton, near Sudbury on January 19.

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