A LORRY driver was killed in a head-on smash with a tractor.

He is the third person to die in a road accident in the past seven days.

The driver, aged 58, was pronounced dead at the scene of the crash, which happened yesterday morning near Gallows Hill on the road from Bere Regis to Wool.

A police spokesman said the lorry driver was from Salisbury but his white flat-bed heavy goods vehicle was registered to a Dorset company.

The 51-year-old tractor driver, from West Dorset, was uninjured but shaken following the crash.

He was checked over by ambulance crew at the scene but did not need hospital treatment.

PC Andy Steele, officers in charge of the case, said: “It’s early days but the green crop spraying John Deere tractor, was travelling south towards Bovington. The lorry was travelling north towards Bere Regis.

“They were involved in a head-on collision and we’re still investigating the actual details.

“As a result the driver of the large heavy goods vehicle suffered fatal injuries.

“The driver of the sprayer was uninjured but shaken, he really had a very lucky escape.”

Dorset Police closed the Bere Regis to Wool road at 9.50am and it was reopened around 5.30pm yesterday.

Poole and Dorchester firefighters attended and Dorset County Council staff also helped to man road blocks and assist in the clear up operation.

PC Steele said: “There was a lot of diesel and debris on the road.”

He added: “We are appealing for the driver of a gold coloured Ford Mondeo who witnessed the incident but didn’t stop to come forward.

“Another lorry driver witnessed it and stopped.

“The gold Mondeo was in front of him and they also stopped but then drove off.”

Amanda Crocker, owner of the Pampered Pigs Pantry on Rye Hill, Bere Regis said: “A lot of people accelerate to get up that hill and it’s a fairly sharp bend.

“There have been a few accidents there before but it’s not a bad road.

“As a farming community, everyone knows everybody and we’re just recovering from the last tractor accident on the Tolpuddle Bypass.”

Shop assistant Mel Hunter added: “We knew something was wrong because it was so quiet here. Hardly any cars came through all morning.”

Anyone with information about the crash is asked to contact PC Steele at the Blandford traffic unit on 01202 222222.

Grim toll of tragedy

THE lorry driver was the third person to die on the roads in Dorset this week.

On Tuesday night, motorcyclist Rob Evans died in a crash on Granby Way, near the Wessex Stadium roundabout.

His death came after Kirk Parsons was killed in a collision with a camper van outside Bovington Tank Museum last Saturday.

The accident yesterday was the seventh fatal crash in south and west Dorset this year and the fourth in May.

Earlier in May an elderly motorist died after collapsing at the wheel of his car on the A35 near Winterbourne Abbas.

Grandfather Dennis Watts, of Bere Regis, died after his tractor was in a collision with a lorry on the Puddletown bypass on April 7.

Earlier this year two motorists died with three weeks of each other at the end of January and February.