Gridlock after road crash death

The car veered across the motorway and hit the bridge barrier

A city was left gridlocked when a major air and ground search was launched after a fatal road crash.

Police at first believed someone may have fled the scene of the accident on the M275 Tipner Bridge in Portsmouth which left a 19-year-old driver dead.

They closed all three lanes, causing traffic to back up through the city after the crash at 2.20pm on Thursday.

At the height of the rush hour some drivers were reporting journey times across the city of six hours.

Police said a blue Rover lost control and swerved across the carriageway before colliding with a crash barrier.

The car was left perched precariously above the harbour

The car was left impaled on the barrier, killing the driver, from Fareham.

The search was called off after police decided no-one else was involved.

Emergency repairs were carried out on the bridge and concrete barriers were lifted into place.

Insp Roger Petherbridge said: "This was a complicated incident and had to be investigated as a serious crime until we could establish that there was no other person involved.

"The emergency services, bridge engineers and the highways agency at the scene worked as quickly as they could to re-open the road and make the bridge safe for the public to use."

One lane of the carriageway reopened at about 2000 GMT, and all three lanes were open by midnight.