HIGHWAY engineers have blamed incorrect weather forecasts and a rush-hour panic for last week's road chaos.

Heavy snowfall in County Durham led to grid-locked roads across much of the county on Thursday at tea-time and left dozens of minor accidents in its wake.

In one accident, a woman from Shotley Bridge suffered serious injuries to her hand after she was crushed by her own car.

The accident happened in Elm Park Road, during the blizzard, as the 36-year-old woman, was closing the boot of her Renault Megane car. A Vauxhall Corsa coming down the steep bank failed to stop and crashed into the Megane, which in turn knocked her down.

Her hand became caught up in the rear tyre of her car and she was trapped under the vehicle until the emergency services arrived.

Police freed the woman, who has not been named, and took her to the minor injuries clinic at Shotley Bridge hospital. The driver of the Corsa, a local man in his sixties, was uninjured.

Angry drivers have criticised the lack of gritters and snow-ploughs on the roads, but Durham County Council's head of highway management Roger Elphick said they were receiving weather forecasts as late as 3.50pm on the day to say there would only be snow on high ground until mid-evening.

He said: "We were prepared for that, but by that time, of course, snow was also falling in most other parts of the county, on lower ground as well.

"When it looked as if a significant fall was likely, most people left work early in an effort to beat the snow and get home, but it meant that the normal rush hour of around two and a half hours was compressed into 45 minutes and the sudden flood of vehicles on to the roads resulted in widespread snarl-ups."

The Meteorological Office said it had not received any complaints, but confirmed that the snow had reached lower regions quicker than they had expected.

Mr Elphick said that even if the forecast had been correct, the snow was preceded by heavy rain which meant it would have been difficult pre-salting the roads, as it would have been washed away.

But many drivers were left fuming because of the road conditions. Traffic came to a standstill in Darlington, Durham, Consett and Chester-le-Street.

Carole Appleby, from Sunnybrow, near Bishop Auckland, said her usual 20-minute journey home from Durham, where she works, became a four-hour nightmare. It took her two hours to progress less than a mile through Durham.

The A1(M) motorway out of Durham was still gridlocked at 6.30pm, even though the blizzard had stopped by then.

Police described conditions as treacherous in villages surrounding Chester-le-Street.