There were a number of accidents on the Kanonenstraße, leading up to the Feldberg, last week.

Three of them took place on Wednesday afternoon (26th September).  A 50 year old driver travelling downhill from the Sandplacken towards Oberursel lost control of his Nissan Almera, which came off the road into a ditch, turned over and ended up on the roof.  The driver was not hurt, but the damage is estimated at €4,000.  Police believe that he had not reduced his speed to take account of the wet road surface.

Several hours later, a Citroen C3 driven by a 69 year old also came off the road at the same spot and hit the crash barrier, causing €5,000 worth of damage.  Again, police believe that the speed of the vehicle played a factor in the accident.

And only a few minutes later a Volvo driven by a 54 year old came along the same stretch of road and braked on seeing the accident, but – possibly due to the right-hand curve at this point – this was not noticed in time by the car behind him.  A 87 year old driving a Mercedes C crashed into the Volvo.  The damage is estimated €10,000.

A day later, on Thursday evening, the road was closed after a head-on collision between two vehicles.  Both drivers were injured and the damage is estimated at around €57,000.  The police investigation at the scene suggests that a 27 year old BMW driver travelling downhill strayed – possibly due to her speed during the bad weather – onto the wrong side of the road, where she collided with an Audi Q5, driven by a 55 year old from Usingen, and had to be cut out of her car by the fire brigade.

The road is a notorious accident blackspot, especially during the summer months.  In July, resurfacing work was even necessary after one accident, and speed checks are often carried out there as well.  Recently, rumble strips were added at one point to try and slow the traffic down.