MTC, Careful with your SAT-NAV!

[HealeyRick]

But my sat nav told me to drive into the river. . .


By Martin Stote

DRIVERS sent off the main road by a diversion thought they would have no problem finding their way home.

Easy, they said, our car satellite navigation systems will help out.

But they were wrong - the devices sent them straight into a river.

Trouble started when a village bypass was closed for repairs.

Many motorists followed a diversion suggested by their sat-nav systems which took them down a narrow, unclassified lane.

But the lane crosses a ford where water can become four feet deep after heavy rain. Many conked out.

Enterprising villagers in Luckington, near Malmesbury, Wiltshire, have been charging £25 to pull them out of the River Avon with tractors.

Parish councillor Lesley Bennett, 59, who lives next to the ford with her husband Dudley, 63, a retired teacher, has even tumbledried victims' clothes.

She said yesterday: "Before the road closure there was one a week but now we're getting one or two a day. When the driver's car conks out he looks stunned and when you ask him what happened he says 'my sat nav told me it was this way'.

"There are signs warning about the water but the fools just plough on regardless. We do what we can to help. I offer to dry people's clothes for them while they wait for help to be towed out.

"I had to explain to my husband why there was a van driver's trousers in our tumble drier. He was sitting in his cab shivering in his boxer shorts, the poor thing." The B4040 was closed in the village of Sherston when a stone wall collapsed and the shortest alternative route runs through Luckington and across the ford.

Kevin Assinder, 39, a printing company director from Chippenham, Wilts, was directed over the ford by the sat nav in his Land Rover Discovery 3 yesterday. He said: "I did wonder about going through but my car had no problems. If I was in a smaller car, though, I think I'd still be sitting there.'" Less fortunate were Julie Jackson, 45, of Carterton, Oxon, and her mother Delcie Fielder, 70, whose Rover 220 proved less riverfriendly. She said: "We went in, the car stopped and then we heard this gurgling sound and water came into the car, covering our feet. This is my daughter's car, so I dread to think what she'll say. I don't know if it's a write-off yet." A spokesman for the Institute of Advanced Motorists said: "If you have to cross a ford, keep your revs up by slipping the clutch and keep a steady speed right the way across." This is not the first time drivers have come a cropper with their sat navs. Earlier this month, motorists were sent to the edge of a 100ft drop at Crackpot in North Yorkshire.

In March, a lorry driver got stuck after following directions on his system and ended up wedged on a narrow stone bridge off the A383 near Newton Abbot in Devon.

A spokesman for TomTom, a leading sat-nav supplier, said it tried to ensure information was as up-to-date as possible.

He added: "Safety is an absolute priority and we encourage our customers to report any problems which we report directly to our providers.

"If a driver ever feels they are being directed down an inappropriate road then a TomTom device can quickly re-route them."


Rick