Caught on film: the moment a lorry driver miscalculates the height of a notorious low Wigan bridge

Many a high-sided vehicle has come to grief on the stone parapet over Prescott Street, causing snarl-ups when it gets wedged underneath.

But on this occasion, dash cam film shows the lorry grind to a halt when the traffic lights go to green as the driver realises there could be a problem.

He gets out of the cab, looks at the height of his truck, calculates if there is any clearance room then – unhelpfully egged on by cackling onlookers when it seems obvious it won’t fit – he gets back inside and moves slowly forward!

To great mirth, the top of the lorry unsurprisingly bumps into the bridge.

There the film ends, although it is assumed that the driver then managed to execute a U-turn rather than charge the bridge at speed and skim the top 2ft off his van.

The road has been the scene of innumerable incidents over the years although in this instance the driver appears to have escaped relatively lightly.

On other occasions, high-sided vehicles have been caused serious damage by becoming stuck fast under the structure and having to be towed out by breakdown trucks, creating all manner of congestion issues and sometimes requiring railway engineers to inspect the bridge for structural damage.

One businessman who works nearby told Wigan Today: “You can’t believe that it happens so often.

"Those who come a cropper are clearly not local to the area, but surely to goodness they know the dimensions of their vehicles. And it’s not like there aren’t huge glaring warning signs either!”