A Royston policeman’s wife is campaigning to make the A505 to Baldock safer after a horror smash broke his back in two places.
Lynsey Langdon has spoken of the ‘massive impact’ of her husband PC Greig Langdon’s injuries, which kept him in hospital for five nights and mean he will not be able to work for the next six months.
Greig, 42, returned home on Monday afternoon to the delight of Lynsey and their three children – but it looks like the recovery process will be a long one, and Lynsey is doing all she can to help stop the same happening to others.
“The day of the crash by far has to be the worst day of my family’s life,” said Lynsey, 39.
“It was just horrible for my three kids to see their dad lying in a bed on his back. My 12-year-old said he didn’t want to see.
“The crash was at a crossing path – where you can hop through the lanes and stop in the middle, and either go the other way or on to another village.
“While this is convenient to save time, it is also ridiculously dangerous.
“The other car that was involved was doing this very thing, but didn’t realise there wasn’t enough time to get over.
“My husband was very lucky, but we need to make it safer on that road. How many people need to get hurt before there is a change?
“The police haven’t released the car yet because they said these were life-changing crash injuries. In fact they said to me they were life-threatening.”
Greig only bought the black Peugeot 307 three weeks ago. He was on the A505 driving to his Hatfield work base on Wednesday last week when he was involved in the crash near the Ashwell turn-off at about 3.40pm, after which both he and the other driver, a woman in her 20s, were hospitalised.
Lynsey has set up a Facebook group called ‘Make The A505 Safer’, which already has more than 1,800 members, and spoken on BBC Three Counties Radio about the crash.
She has received messages from others over social media telling of similar experiences, including a woman whose daughter died on that stretch of the road – and is calling for the central reservations from which drivers can pull out onto the main carriageway to replaced with a roundabout.
“What I’m calling for is for all these central reservations to be closed between Royston and the Bygrave Lodge recycling plant,” she said.
“They’re where all the accidents happen. They’re trying to cross four lanes of traffic. There’s so many people who say how dangerous it is.
“They should close all of them and put in a big roundabout just by the recycling plant – then you could go down and come around.
“It’s got to stop. It may be a ways around, but I’m not about saving time, I’m about saving lives.”
Speaking of Greig’s return home on Monday, she said: “The kids are ecstatic. For us it’s a bit mixed really, emotions all over the place.
“It’s going to be a long period of adjustment for everybody.”
Police are investigating the circumstances of the crash and have appealed for witnesses to come forward.
Anyone with information should contact Sgt Sam Cordingley from the road policing unit on the non-emergency number 101.
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