A CORONER has called the death of a motorcyclist who died after crashing into a fallen tree on a road 'a tragic accident'.

Colin Smith, 61, of Liversedge, West Yorkshire, sustained fatal injuries when a tree fell into his path on the A683 at Cautley, near Sedbergh, on August 3, 2022.

Assistant coroner for Cumbria Dr Nick Shaw heard from a witness that Mr Smith, who suffered from terminal cancer, was riding his motorcycle along a rural stretch of the A683 toward Sedbergh when catastrophe struck.

A statement read to the Coroner’s Court at Cockermouth by Lorna Hinch, a learning support assistant, said that she was driving along the road at around toward Sedbergh at around 11.30am on August 3.

Ms Hinch said she was driving at around 40mph and noticed a lone motorcyclist behind her following 'at an appropriate distance for about five minutes' but looking for an opportunity to overtake on the winding stretch of road.

She described the road as being light with traffic, cool, and with good visibility.

The court heard that Mr Smith, who had been head of Information Technology at Huddersfield University, overtook Ms Hinch after she had pulled around a bend onto a straight stretch of road, around 200 metres long.

The statement said: "I saw a large tree falling across the road, everything was in slow motion, and the world went silent."

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She said she believed Mr Smith had 'no opportunity to react', and 'there was no way he would have been able to stop'.

She herself performed an emergency brake and was able to stop 'around one car-length' away from the fallen tree.

Ms Hinch called 999 and emergency services arrived and attempted to revive Mr Smith but he was pronounced dead at 12.06 pm.

Other witnesses submitted statements who described the scene just after the collision.

Some said that they had witnessed a tree 'hanging precariously' across the road earlier in the day but nothing was reported to highway authorities.

The court heard from Mr Smith’s GP that he was receiving palliative chemotherapy for colorectal cancer, a condition which a postmortem examination confirmed.

The toxicology report showed no evidence of unexpected drugs or alcohol in his system.

A cause of death was given as multiple injuries, caused by a road traffic collision.

Dr Shaw concluded: "As road traffic collisions go, this is remarkably straightforward.

"We have excellent witnesses describing exactly what happened, their statements are as good as any dashcam evidence.

"This is one of those one-in-a-million chances.

"Somewhere in the world, somewhere a tree will fall, someone will run into it, and sadly, this happened to be Colin on the A683 last year.

"It has been observed that the tree was falling but as far as I'm aware nobody had reported it.

"There is no fault to apply to anybody in this situation, it was a tragic accident.

"In my estimation, these injuries would have been instantly fatal, despite efforts of police officers and paramedics I don't think there was any chance for colin after the accident."