• A car transporter involved in a fatal accident in
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Stockton-on-Tees on 30 April is being sought by the police in Cleveland.
The accident happened on the Church Yard Link Road, near Stockton's town centre at 2.12pm when a cyclist rode into the back of the transporter which was travelling in slow moving traffic.
The cyclist died as a result of his injuries but the transporter did not stop at the scene and has not been traced.
Police describe the vehicle as a blue artic carrying cars similar to Vauxhal Novas with a fully laden top-deck and partladen bottom deck. Officers do not believe that the transporter was responsible for the accident and think the driver may not even have known he was involved in a collision.
Sgt Bob Thurston and PC Brian Forester would like the driver of any car transporter fitting this description who was in Stockton on that date to contact them on (0624) 248184 ext 203. • The research fund established by the Institute of Road Transport Engineers to find out why so many truck wheels and wheel fixings fail was given fresh impetus last week, when Leyland Daf contributed nearly £1,500, thus fulfilling a pledge.
Handing over a cheque for £1,463 to ERIE president Sir James Duncan, Leyland Daf parts director, Brian Smith explained that the latest cash injection is the result of a commitment given a year ago by Multipart to donate one penny for every wheel it sold in the past twelve months.
Leyland DAf stresses that the sum does not indicate that more than 146,900 Leyland wheel nuts have failed in the past year, since Multipart supplies components for a wide range of vehicles — not only Leylands — and some operators replace wheel nuts for reasons other than failure.
Martin Shelley of the Department of Trade and Industry, which has contributed half the £60,000 raised so far for lost wheels research, nevertheless interprets the size of the cheque as good evidence of the scale of the problem.
"Despite denials by the Department of Transport, this cheque indicates there is a problem," he said at Solihull last week. Shelley also revealed that a British Standards Institution sub-committee has been given the task of compiling a new British Standard for CV wheel fixings, although the IRTE/DTIfunded MIRA research which should lead to it is still "in early days".