Oh my God, she's gonna blow...

Travelling west from my Uncle's on Monday we hit the M62 motorway at about 5pm. Everything was going OK for the first hour, including a quick stop at the M-way services for a jimmy riddle ;)

On the way back to the car I paused briefly at the store to check if there were any decent mags to read. Nope. No Custom Car, no Street Machine... I got back in the car...

A little further west along the M62 we started seeing smoke. A smoky old motor maybe?

And then flames.

And then everything stopped.

The whole 3 lanes came to a complete standstill.

10+ firetenders (in rotation), 2 fire support vehicles, 2 cop cars, an ambulance, motorway maintenance, a tow truck - all passed us by on the "hard shoulder"...

It was only a quarter mile or so ahead, we saw the fire as the traffic started to slow. Then there was smoke, burning rubber, smell of hot metal. A couple of explosions. BANG BANG.

The sheep on the West Yorks moorland couldn't stand the fumes, so they all buggered off.

And 2 and a half hours later the sun went down; it was dark, cold, the car was steaming up and, more than anything, I considered strangling my brother 'cos he's an impatient, fidgety and annoying "little" twat ...

I kept my cool. He lives.

The traffic started to move. Hoo-fucking-ray.

Normally I despair at the rubber-neckers who slow down free-flowing traffic just for a gawp - but after 150 minutes of going nowhere I thought we deserved to see what the hold up was...

A truck, not much of it - totally burnt out. 2 lanes completely unusable, cones and lights kept us away from the wreck. Apparently "It was one of the worst lorry fires we have ever had to attend. All we saved from the lorry was the front number plate!" said a spokesman for the Huddersfield fire station, "the fire had been so intense it had melted the road surface".

So there you go.

Luckily nobody was hurt but one guy further back in the huge traffic jam had lapsed into a coma. I hope he's OK.

If you want the full story you can read Lorry inferno blocks M62.

We arrived at the seaside a little later than we anticipated but still had time for a pizza and a bottle of brown ale.