A woman was taken to hospital with life-threatening injuries after her car collided with a trailer outside a north-east town.
The emergency services were called to the A948 Ellon to Auchnagatt road shortly after 4pm yesterday.
Police said that the woman’s white Volkswagen Polo collided with a trailer being towed by a 4×4.
The incident took place close to the junction with Golf Road, just north of Ellon.
The woman who had been driving the vehicle was cut free from the wreckage by fire crews, who had been called from Ellon and Maud.
She was treated by paramedics at the scene of the incident, before being taken to Aberdeen Royal Infirmary for further treatment.
Last night, a police spokeswoman described her injuries as life-threatening.
She added: “We were called to the scene of a collision between a VW Polo and a trailer on the A948 near Ellon.
“A woman was taken to hospital with potentially life-threatening injuries.”
The driver of the 4×4, and the other occupants of the Polo, were not seriously injured.
The A948 was shut for several hours and local diversions were put in place to keep drivers away from the scene
Police could be seen carrying out investigations around the location of the incident, and asking bystanders if they saw the crash take place.
Although the 4×4 was relatively unscathed following the crash, the front of the white Polo was destroyed.
The vehicle’s front wheel had been detached, and debris could be seen scattered across the road.
The collision comes following a similar incident earlier this summer just a short distance away on the same road, which is used by motorists as a bypass around Ellon.
At the end of May, a woman was taken to hospital with serious injuries after a two-car collision on the A948 at its junction with Knockothie Crescent, just around the corner from where last night’s crash took place.
And in June, a motorcyclist was injured and taken to Aberdeen Royal Infirmary after a crash involving a Mazda on the A948 around the halfway point between Auchnagatt and Ellon, at the Stuartfield turnoff.