ITV Documentaries

Crash: Anatomy Of An Accident (2016x14)

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Crash: Anatomy of An Accident “I know that there’s going to be more cars hitting, I know that there’s going to be more noise, I know there’s going to be danger but we’re running towards the accident not away from it. It’s just this overwhelming feeling that you’ve got to get people out”. - Jill Hudson, car passenger This new single documentary for ITV focuses on the personal stories of victims caught up in a major road crash involving 130 vehicles and 300 people. On the morning of September 5, 2013, dozens of cars, lorries, vans and motorbikes crashed into one another in thick fog on a 100ft high bridge linking Sheppey Island in Kent with the mainland. Shocking pictures of cars and other vehicles caught up in the mayhem topped newspaper websites and social media as the fog cleared and the news began to break. At the time, police described the fact no-one had died as miraculous. Told from the points of view of those at the heart of the accident, this programme uses testimony from individuals trapped in vehicles, those injured in the incident, and the rescuers who freed them with dramatic reconstructions alongside archive news footage to build a vivid insight into how the people involved felt and acted in the moment and the way the Sheppey Crossing crash changed all their lives. The morning of the crash started normally for the drivers and passengers, who didn’t yet realise the fog that had descended on the bridge, had made driving conditions treacherous. Driver Lisa Snow says: “I just set my day as normal, woke up as normal. I was ready a little bit earlier so I thought, ‘Do you know what, I’ll leave five, ten minutes earlier today.’” Out on the dual carriageway, it quickly became apparent that crossing the bridge would require some care. Driver Graham Thwaites says: “On some days when it’s quite foggy you come up out of it, it can be clear as day. But that day it just didn’t happen. That just got worse an