76874-14POLICE have denied there has been an increase in accidents on the M4 between junction 16 and 17 in recent weeks.

In the past month, there have been 14 crashes on the stretch between the Chippenham and Swindon east exits.

The latest happened yesterday when a car transporter overturned near the Dauntsey flyover, as reported in the late edition of yesterday's Adver

Police say that the trucker and car driver had a lucky escape.

The lorry driver escaped with a broken arm, and the car driver suffered only shock.

Insp Wayne Smith, head of Swindon traffic section, said that there had been no more crashes than usual in the past month. "Fourteen is a fairly standard figure," he said.

"There is nothing wrong with that stretch of road. Accidents usually come down to driver error.

"In fact the route was recently given four stars in a safety survey based on volume of traffic and the number of injury accidents."

On Monday, another car transporter was involved in a crash.

A Peugeot 206 was in collision with the HGV on the eastbound carriageway.

Luckily, there were no serious injuries.

Three days previously there were two more crashes.

A motorcyclist was in collision with a saloon car and suffered minor injuries.

Less than an hour before, traffic ground to a halt when a truck had a blow-out.

Insp Smith said better driving was the key to lowering the accident statistics.

"It's just about driving sensibly," he said.

"Take regular breaks, wear a seatbelt, don't talk on your mobile phone while driving and don't rubberneck going past accidents."

He said road accidents were down so far this year in the Swindon area.

"We've only had one fatality in three months," he said. "Last year, we had eight in total and there were 13 the previous year."

Yesterday's crash at 6.30am caused tailbacks all morning.

The transporter was heading eastbound when the driver lost control and ploughed through the central reservation and toppled over on the opposite carriageway.

Two of seven Vauxhall Corsas loaded onto the lorry came loose, and debris was scattered across the road.

Police are still investigating the cause.

Lanes two and three westbound and lane three eastbound were shut.

Traffic was flowing smoothly again by 1pm, although lane three on both sides remained closed.

Tamash Lal