TWO men returning from a stag night party crashed into a motorway central reservation after a wheel came off their BMW, a court heard yesterday.

The car hit the central crash barrier on the A1(M) at Allerton Park, near Knaresborough, in the early hours of December 7, scattering debris across the northbound carriageway, Caroline Midgley, prosecuting, told Harrogate magistrates.

She said the two men, who had been drinking, left the BMW partly on the hard-shoulder and partly on the grass verge. They were found by police a couple of miles away, about to begin walking along the Harrogate and Knaresborough southern bypass. Both men were arrested after breath-tests showed they were over the drink-drive limit.

Both were due to appear in court yesterday, but John Hurworth confessed that he had been the driver.

He was fined a total of £290 with £70 costs after admitting drink-driving, failing to stop after an accident and failing to report an accident.

Hurworth, a 30-year-old machine operator and father of two from Lynndale, Wolsingham, County Durham was also banned from driving for 18 months while similar charges against the car's owner Dominique Bajic, 38, of Denbury Mount, Holmewood, Bradford, were dropped.

Magistrates were told Hurworth had driven because he had drunk less.