Crash which killed mother and two daughters 'could have been avoided'

STV
Family: The Copelands before the fatal accident.

A crash which claimed the lives of a mother and her two daughters was caused after a crane spilled hydraulic fluid all over the road, an inquiry has ruled.

Nurse Ann Copeland and her young girls Niamh, ten, and seven-year-old Ciara died instantly when their Citreon Saxo skidded and crashed into another car on the A92 near St Cyrus, Aberdeenshire on January 9, 2008.

A sheriff has urged the UK Government to create new laws "as a matter of urgency" removing an exemption which prevents mobile cranes from having regular roadworthiness tests.

The FAI found that the crash was caused when hydraulic fluid leaked onto the road from a mobile crane owned by William Whyte Cargo Handlers Ltd.

The fluid leaked through a hole in a hydraulic hose which had been wrongly positioned and had rubbed against machinery.

If the company had better maintenance or inspections in place, the three deaths may have been avoided, a sheriff has ruled.

On top of a change of law, he has recommended that better information be issued about the service life of hydraulic hoses and crane operators are warned of their responsibility to make sure their vehicles are roadworthy.

During the 20-day hearing, witness Carole Smith said the corner where Ann Copeland later lost control of her car felt "more slippy than ice".

Colin McLachlan, driving the other car involved in the crash, said the collision was "inevitable" because "not even a top rally driver could have done anything with that skid".

Hamish Anderson, who drove the crane along the A92, later told police he could have lost up to six or seven gallons of hydraulic oil through the leaking pipe.

The inquiry heard that Mr Anderson seldom carried out safety checks on the mobile crane and simply ticked the right boxes.

Mr Anderson had no initial or refresher training in respect of daily or weekly checks of the crane, and repairs were only ordered once a vehicle had broken down.

"Thorough examinations" were carried out every six months, but any defects found were not always repaired before the next examination, the inquiry heard.

The sheriff ruled that William Whyte's had a "defective system of work" at the time of the accident because they did no preventative maintenance, failed to do daily or weekly checks and wrongly relied on the six-monthly examinations as being maintenance checks.

The company has now improved its system of work, the sheriff heard.

Tim Watson, a consultant engineer, told the inquiry that there are now "considerably more" mobile cranes on the road than 30 years ago and they are now much larger and more complex than they used to be.

The sheriff ruled that it was "absolutely illogical" that smaller vehicles had to undergo MOT examinations, but that mobile cranes do not.

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