A woman has been hospitalised with a suspected neck injury after her car was caught out at one of the Illawarra’s most dangerous right-hand turns.
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The woman, believed aged in her 50s, was travelling down Mount Ousley about 11.30am when her Ford Falcon collided with the side of a recycling truck.
The truck was turning right into the northbound lanes of the M1 Princes Motorway, leading up the mountain, when the collision occurred.
The truck came to rest in the protected turning lane, with some damage to its undercarriage.
The collision caused the closure of the motorway’s southbound lanes for more than an hour.
Andrew Barber, station commander Wollongong Fire Station said wet weather may have been a contributor to the crash.
“It’s wet, it’s a little bit greasy here," he said. “You should slow down in wet weather.”
Light traffic was diverted onto Mount Ousley Road, causing congestion around Wollongong’s Gateway precinct; B doubles were parked until emergency services cleared the crash site.
Firefighters assisted the woman from her car. She was placed on spinal board and taken by ambulance to Wollongong Hospital.
The right-hand turn would be removed under a re-design of the troubled roadway.
According to the preferred option report for the Mount Ousley interchange, there were 34 crashes recorded near the intersection in the decade between July 2004 and June 2014.
Of these, one was a fatal crash resulting in one fatality and four injuries, 13 were injury crashes that resulted in 23 injuries and 20 were non-casualty crashes.
Twenty-five of the crashes involved vehicles turning right out of Mount Ousley Road onto the Princes Motorway, which is proposed for grade separation.
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