SOMERSET NEWS: Fireworks display not to blame for M5 disaster

A CORONER has ruled that smoke from a fireworks display was not to blame for the deaths of seven people in the M5 horror crash in Somerset in 2011.

The seven people died in a 34-vehicle pile-up on the M5 at Taunton back on November 4, 2011 - one of the worst motorway accidents in UK history.

An eight-day inquest has been held at the Shire Hall in Taunton and concluded today (Thursday, April 17, 2014).

During the inquest there was much discussion about the weather conditions with the area being clouded in thick fog on the night of the accident and that there was smoke coming from a nearby fireworks display at Taunton Rugby Club.

But coroner Michael Rose “dismissed smoke being the cause of the crash” although he admitted that the smoke “may have added to the intensity of the reduced visibility.”

Mr Rose concluded that the deaths were as a result of a road traffic collision after the vehicles they were travelling in had entered an area of “reduced visibility.”

He is now planning to hold a meeting with representatives of a number of organisations to look at how to prevent a similar accident from happening again.

The meeting will be held on June 10 where Mr Rose will meet with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills; Health and Safety Executive; Highways Agency; British Pyrotechnic Association; and Taunton Deane Borough Council.

On the agenda will be a number of points including the education of pyrotechnic operators about the problems of holding firework displays in foggy condtions; whether there should be a legal distance between major roads and public firework displays are held; and if the Highways Agency should provide visibility detection devices.

Geoffrey Counsell, who was in charge of the fireworks display at Taunton Rugby Club, was cleared of breaching health and safety laws during a hearing at Bristol Crown Court back in December last year.

The seven people to die in the crash were Pamela and Tony Adams, of South Wales; Terry Brice, from South Gloucestershire; Michael and Maggie Barton, of Berkshire; Kye Thomas, of Cornwall; and Malcolm Beacham, of Somerset.

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