A SINGLE-track lane was completely blocked on Friday afternoon when a giant 50-ton crane slipped into a ditch.

The incident on Manson Lane in Monmouth blocked access for some two hours while workers on the nearby building development struggled to free the vehicle.

Signs at either end of the two-mile long lane actually warn that it is unsuitable for HGVs, although the one at the junction with the Hereford Road is completely obscured by a hedge that has grown over it.

Residents trying to use the lane and a minibus returning schoolchildren home at the end of the day had to take a four-mile detour through the Buckholt before the crane was shored up and extracted.

It’s not the first time vehicles have got into difficulty on the narrow rural lane.

A scaffolding lorry went over the side of the road down into a field, along with a van and a car, three years ago, when they all swerved to avoid a giant pothole without realising the verge wasn’t

underpinned.

Two years ago a car driven at ‘racing speed’ hit a bank and overturned just below cottages, while there have also been a number of crashes on the 90 degree blind S-bends half-way up the lane.