MOTORISTS who put other people's lives at risk by speeding will from today find themselves faced with more than a fine.

In a unique North Yorkshire speed-check initiative, speeders could also be con-fronted with the gory consequences of their actions.

By showing drivers pictures and explaining just what happens to the human body during a car crash, the county's three emergency services hope to shock them out of the habit of breaking the limit.

Speeding drivers stopped by police will be handed to paramedics from the ambu-lance service who will tell them, from personal experience, the kinds of injuries crash victims can expect at different speeds.

Then, to hammer home the message, a county firefighter will detail what kind of damage will be caused to vehicles involved in accidents at different speeds.

Motorists will then be shown photographs of wreckage, vividly illustrating how the degree of damage escalates as speed rises.

But the ordeal does not end there.

Drivers are then passed back to a traffic officer to learn their fate for the speeding offence. This can be anything from a stiff warning to an appearance in court.

The launch of the Three Nines campaign comes on the day Government figures re-veal that 68 people died on North Yorkshire's road, and more than 4,800 were injured.

Traffic Constable Steve Ball of North Yorkshire police said the message being pushed was that speed causes accidents and that the greater the speed, the greater the damage, injury and likelihood of death.

"Accident casualties are more than statistics to us - police, fire and ambulance officers are the ones who have to go into the wreckage and deal with the injured and distressed people laying there, and we take speeding personally," said TC Ball.

"We believe this is a way in which we can give the benefit of experience, training and expertise directly to drivers.

"It is a simple message and we believe it will come very convincingly from the men and women who have to deal with the consequences of inappropriate speed."

The safety campaign will involve a series of swoops on roads across North York-shire police's western area - which includes Harrogate, Boroughbridge and Knaresborough - without warning throughout the summer.