By Gary Cooper

A STUNNED Forfar couple last night said it was a miracle no one had been injured or killed when an articulated lorry left the road and landed in their garden.

Bruce and Beryl Tyrie spoke after the truck crossed over the road, mounted the pavement, careered between two lamp-posts and crossed a grass verge before coming to a halt after demolishing part of their garden wall.

The crash happened at 4.30 pm as the truck headed into the centre of Forfar along Glamis Road, near the Don and Low textile factory.

The Tyries were watching TV in their Westfield Crescent home, which looks on to Glamis Road, when the accident happened.

“I just heard a rumble and turned round to see the lorry at the foot of the garden,” Mrs Tyrie said. “I couldn’t believe it.”

Her husband called the police and an ambulance for the 63-year-old driver who was sitting in the cab of the Iveco tractor unit.

“He looked as though he was suffering from shock,” Mr Tyrie said. “He didn’t look very great. Beryl made him a strong cup of tea with sugar and he looked a lot better having had that.”

Mr Tyrie said it was only good fortune that the accident did not turn out much worse when the truck and its curtain-side trailer careered off the road.

“It’s a big lorry. I understand it was fully loaded, and it is very lucky that it never toppled.

“It is very fortunate that nothing was coming the other way when the lorry veered off the road and that no one was walking on the pavement.

“We’ve lost about seven yards of our garden wall but the main thing is no one’s hurt.”

The driver is understood to have been taken home by a colleague after he was checked by paramedics.

Police said the driver might have become ill at the wheel in the run up to the crash, but did not suffer any injury as a result of the accident.

The position of the lorry meant traffic was reduced to one lane and a heavy recovery truck was brought in to haul it clear.

It winched the vehicle, belonging to a Carnoustie firm, out of the garden and across the grass verge inch-by-inch.