A MAN died on Thursday morning after the car he was driving crashed into a wall in Bournemouth town centre.

Multiple police units, paramedics and the fire service were called to the roundabout at Holdenhurst Road, near Asda, shortly before 6am.

The man's Jeep 4x4 came to rest against the wall on the town centre side of the roundabout, just past the St Swithun's Road exit.

 

The scene was cordoned off and road closures were put in place, causing major traffic hold-ups for rush hour drivers, and bus services were diverted.

The 53-year-old Bournemouth driver of the Jeep, named locally on Friday as David Gregory, was taken to Royal Bournemouth Hospital but died shortly after.

Tributes have been paid to father-of-two Mr Gregory.

Insp Matt Butler, of Dorset Police's Traffic Unit, told the Daily Echo at the scene: “Just before six o'clock this morning we received a call to say that a vehicle had collided with a wall at the roundabout here.

“We attended the scene, along with paramedics, and the male driver was taken from the scene to hospital by ambulance. Sadly, he died at the hospital.

“We are now at the scene investigating the causes of the collision, working out exactly how it happened and why it happened.”

Speaking earlier, Insp Matt Baxter, of Bournemouth Police, said it was not believed that any other vehicles were involved.

The road was closed until shortly before 11am while accident investigators combed the scene for clues.

The coroner has been informed and any witnesses to the crash should call Dorset Police in confidence on 101, quoting incident number 10:37.

DORSET ROAD DEATHS

THE man who lost his life was the 24th person to die on Dorset's roads this year.

With two-and-a-half months of 2013 left, the grim statistic is now just one short of the 25 that lost their lives on the county's roads in the whole of 2012.

Thursday's crash happened just days after a similar smash in Portland, where 24-year-old Aidan Williams-Martin died when his car hit a wall in Southwell Road in the early hours of Sunday.

The figures include pedestrians who were in collisions with vehicles and 43-year-old Fiona Margaret Vigar, who died when she fell from her horse near Bridport, as well as Daniel Robbie, 23, from Bournemouth, who was killed in a suspected hit-and-run as he rode a children's micro scooter along the A35 Upton Bypass.

The youngest to die this year was 16-year-old Jade Clark, who lost her life when her scooter was involved in a collision on the A31 at Ringwood, just over the Dorset border, in February.

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