A Tesla car was severely damaged in a crash in Bolton, as heavy rain caused chaos on roads around Greater Manchester on Friday night.
Police are now warning of the dangers of rain and urging motorists to "drive to the road conditions, not the speed limit". The appeal was prompted by a spate of crashes in the bad weather, including the one that wrecked the expensive electric car.
Greater Manchester Police posted a photo of what was left of the Tesla after it crashed in a 40mph zone of the A666, which was severely affected by heavy rain and standing water when the accident happened. The cheapest Tesla currently on sale in the UK costs almost £40,000 new.
Fortunately, no one was badly hurt in the crash. Greater Manchester Police tweeted: "Please drive to the conditions, not the limit. The driver of this Tesla on the A666 in Bolton found out the hard way what heavy rain and standing water can do to a vehicle. Luckily no serious injuries."
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The MancTraffic Twitter account, which updates on road and traffic conditions, retweeted the picture with the words: "Quite a few of these today with the weather conditions."
One Twitter user suggested that variable speed limits depending on the weather conditions could be a good idea. @NthrnCyclistTVL wrote: "We really need separate wet and dry speed limits like in France." And they suggested that when a traffic officer "can't work out driving to the dry limit in heavy rain is at least careless driving, the law does the thinking for them".
The GMP Twitter account clarified that the crash happened in an area not covered by speed cameras, although some parts of the A666 do have 50mph average speed cameras. It wrote: "This was just after the slip road on St Peter Way, off Bury Old Rd near the old Audi garage. Well-lit area and cats eyes present.
"This part however is 40mph & not covered yet by the average speed cameras. They start after the Bradford Street slip road."
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