Teenager was driving tipper truck in fatal crash

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/feb/13/bath-tipper-truck-crash-teenage-driver-phillip-potter

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The driver of a runaway tipper truck involved in a collision that killed four people, including a four-year-old girl, was a teenager who had celebrated qualifying to drive an articulated lorry just five days earlier.

Phillip Potter, 19, received the congratulations of friends and relatives after posting a picture on Facebook in which he posed proudly in front of a lorry holding his new licence.

On Monday evening he was driving a 32-tonne truck that apparently careered out of control on a very steep and narrow hill on the outskirts on Bath. It ploughed into Mitzi Rosanna Steady, four, who was walking with her grandmother Margaret Rogers. Mitzi died instantly. Her grandmother remains critically ill in hospital in Bristol.

The truck overturned on a Volvo at the bottom of the hill in the village of Weston, also killing executives Phillip Allen, 52, and Robert Parker, 59, and their driver, Stephen Vaughan, 34.

Potter, a farmer’s son from Wiltshire, was treated in hospital for minor injuries and has since been discharged. Police spoke to him while he was in hospital and inquiries are continuing. No arrests have been made and no further developments in the investigation are expected before next week.

A relative of Potter described him as loyal and hardworking. The female family member, who did not want to be identified, said: “He is quite reserved in some respects but he is a lovely person. He’s loyal and a hardworking, nice man. Nobody wants to be in this situation. It is all very, very difficult.

“If you could change tomorrow, or change yesterday, wouldn’t you just? It’s like all accidents, we just wish we weren’t there at that particular time. We would all change it. We all feel very sorry about it all.

“If I was involved in any accident and it was really not good, I would never drive again. I gave him a big hug the other day and I said to him: ‘We are all with you and feel for you.’”

Potter’s mother answered the door of their farmhouse and said she had been advised against talking.

Potter posed with his licence on Wednesday 4 February. His father, Frederick, wrote on Facebook: “Very proud day of Phillip Potter passing his HGV artic test first time day after his nineteenth birthday well done – feeling happy.”

It is understood that Potter had been qualified to drive certain categories of lorries for some months. He also has extensive experience driving tractors.

Police are continuing to investigate why the truck was on Lansdown Lane in Bath, where residents have long complained about lorries and other vehicles using it to skip around the centre of the city. The road has a width restriction but no weight limit.

On Thursday police formally identified the three men, all from south Wales, who were killed. Earlier in the week Mitzi’s family issued a photo and brief statement: “Mitzi Rosanna Steady aged four, loved and missed by us all.”

Neighbours and friends continued to express their shock in a book of condolence at Weston library. Resident Lorraine Evans wrote that she had witnessed the tragedy with her son and father. “All I can see is that lorry coming towards us and I’m so thankful to be here now,” she wrote. “But I carry so much guilt and sadness for the lives lost! I wish there was something I could do or say to take your pain away.”