Lorry driver arrested after leaving bridge covered in thousands of potatoes
A lorry driver has been detained for risking the lives of fellow motorists after leaving thousands of potatoes on a bridge.
The potatoes – now more smashed potatoes than anything – were found blanketing a key bridge linking two Danish islands yesterday morning.
The first load was seen scattering the bridge on the westbound side at 6:35am local time before being seen shortly after on the eastbound.
The winding Storebælt Bridge connects the island of Zealand, where the capital city Copenhagen is, with Funen Island.
Police, it was safe to say, weren’t sure what to make of the sight.
‘It’s weird,’ police spokesman Kenneth Taanquist said.
‘We are working on two hypotheses: it is either an accident or it is something that has been done deliberately.’
But in a twist to the saga, a third batch of the veggies was found on a road near Kolding, a seaport on the Jutland peninsula about 40 miles west of the Funene city of Odense.
A truck driver, 57, has since been detained on suspicion of causing reckless endangerment to life.
The Vejdirektoratet, otherwise called the Danish Road Directorate, urged drivers to take care when going down the spuddy 11-mile bridge.
Queues of vehicles were reported on either side of the bridge as well as the tunnel link between the two islands.
As of today, the agency says that traffic has returned to a normal rate.
Danish public broadcaster DR reported that the spilt potatoes happened on the same day Denmark’s parliament, the Folketing, passed new legislation taxing truck drivers transporting heavy loads.
Bill No. L 73 introduces a raft of green policies. Among them will be drivers of petrol and diesel-fuelled vehicles over 3.15 tonnes being taxed 1.3 kroner (9p) per kilometre from 2025.
Parliamentarians argue that having too many gas-guzzling cars on motorways is environmentally unsustainable, the latest bid to reach the country’s climate target of a 70% reduction in planet-warming emissions by 2030.
Petrol prices in Denmark are among the most expensive in the world, amounting to about £5.30 a gallon.
Some truckers, however, aren’t too keen on the new tax.
Major thoroughfares, such as those leading from the border of Germany, have been blocked by lorry drivers in recent weeks who argue that the tax will eat into their livelihoods.
The truck drivers’ union, DTL, has accused the government of introducing the tax as a way for the ‘state to earn some extra cash’, the union’s spokesperson, Erik Østergaard, told trade publication Transportmagasinet.
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