A pensioner was airlifted to hospital with life-threatening injuries today after his car collided with a lorry.
Police, fire, paramedics and an air ambulance were sent to the scene of the A9 Thurso to Helmsdale road after the smash, which happened south of the Georgemas Railway Bridge in Caithness.
Firefighters worked for more than an hour to free the 75-year-old from the wreckage of his car, before he was flown to Raigmore Hospital in Inverness.
Specific details of his injuries were unknown last night, but police confirmed he was in a life-threatening condition.
Three fire crews from Thurso and Wick were sent to the scene at about 1.40pm. A heavy rescue unit from Inverness was also deployed, but was stood down before arriving.
Police were also joined by two ambulances, and an air ambulance flew the man to hospital at about 3.25pm.
The rescue effort centred around a badly damaged blue car, which had come to a rest at the side of the southbound carriageway of the road.
A police spokesman said: “It was a serious crash and it is believed that the driver of the car has sustained life-threatening injuries.”
He described the male lorry driver and female car passenger as “walking wounded”.
The road was closed for several hours as emergency services helped the casualties, and while collision investigators carried out their work. Traffic was diverted via the B874 road through Halkirk.
Landward Caithness councillor Gillian Coghill, who runs a farm about two miles from the crash scene, said she was out working with her sheep at the time of the accident.
She added: “I just hope the man will be okay.
“The sun was very bright at about 2pm and where the accident would be, you would catch the sun coming over the bridge. By the time rescue services got there it was actually hailstones, but in between the sun was very bright.
“It is actually blind as you approach the bridge. There was a fatal collision there a few years ago where two young men came over the bridge and there was a car in the middle of the road and both guys were killed. It’s a dangerous bit of road.”
Just 30 minutes after the crash, the A96 Inverness-Aberdeen road was closed in both directions after a Ford transit van and Ford Focus car collided to the west of Nairn.
A man suffered minor injuries as a result of the crash and was taken by road ambulance to Raigmore Hospital in Inverness for observations.
A police spokeswoman also confirmed that there was a lot of debris on the road as a result of the collision.
Queues of traffic built up on either side of the crash scene and police diverted traffic via Moss-side road. At about 4pm the road partially reopened and police were directing traffic, before fully reopening 20 minutes later.