A TRAFFIC policeman has revealed that he dealt with 18 accidents in about two hours on York's roads during the recent morning of ice mayhem.

Traffic constable Steve Bushby says he can barely recall an occasion in his career when he had so many incidents to deal with in such a short space of time.

He said he had to travel from one accident to another, check in each case that no one was hurt, and then move straight on to dealing with the next one.

He said the crashes, early on Saturday, January 4, had not just happened on the A59, where the Evening Press has previously reported seven incidents, including one in which a van went on to the York-Harrogate railway line, and the York Outer Ring Road, where a man died after a security van crashed with a lorry in an accident believed by police to be linked to ice on the road.

He said there were several other accidents on the ring road, and others on the B1225 York-Wetherby road and on the A64 to the north-east of York, but within the city boundary.

His comments came as members of City of York Council prepared tonight to discuss the authority's gritting procedures in the wake of the morning of chaos. Officers have said the decision to pre-grit roads the afternoon before, but not to grit again early on Saturday, was made because a weather forecast had failed to predict a fall in temperatures.

Liberal Democrat leader Steve Galloway is asking what has been done to ensure roads are properly gritted in a timely way in the future.

Updated: 12:13 Tuesday, January 14, 2003