Check your tractor wheel nuts now, recommends Norfolk tractor driver Mark Raven.

He was travelling from one farm to another on back roads when one of the rear wheels on his tractor parted company with the rest of the machine, headed across the road and came to rest upright in a ditch.

He assumes that the nuts must have been working themselves loose for some time and suggests that other tractor drivers take note of his near-miss by checking their wheel nuts are done up tightly. In this case damage to the tractor was limited to the mudguard and lights, and a loader was used to simply lift up the corner of the machine to allow the errant wheel to be put back on.