A LORRY driver has blamed a satellite navigation (sat-nav) system and bad advice from locals for a crash that took out a tourist interpretation board in Barnard Castle.
The driver, who asked not to be named, was travelling from Bishop Auckland to Glasgow on Friday, December 27, when his sat-nav directed through Barnard Castle, across the County Bridge, towards the A66.
He said he realised the County Bridge is closed to heavy goods vehicles when he saw signs at the Market Cross and rolled down his window to ask a pedestrian if he could turn around further down The Bank.
The driver, who moved to England from Poland 15 years ago, said: “He said, ‘yeah, yeah, carry on straight’. In the last moment I saw there was no roundabout so I tried to turn around.”
While attempting to manoeuvre the vehicle around along Bridgegate the rear of the lorry smashed into a tourist interpretation board.
The driver complained: “Everybody takes out their phones and starts recording. They don’t warn me. Nobody even used their horns to warn me.”
The collision levelled the board, broke up some of the stonework along the side of the road and obliterated the rear lights rack on the back of the lorry.
