EASY DOES IT: Batemans Bay Fire and Rescue officers retrieve a car from rocks on Wednesday night.
EASY DOES IT: Batemans Bay Fire and Rescue officers retrieve a car from rocks on Wednesday night.
An elderly man escaped unharmed after he lost control of his car and crashed it onto rocks on Wednesday night.
Police and Batemans Bay Fire and Rescue NSW personnel were called to the crash in Clyde Street at about 7.30pm, and found the car wedged on rocks on the Clyde River west of the Batemans Bay bridge.
According to police, the 82-year-old Ulladulla driver had parked his car on the foreshore facing the river when he inadvertently accelerated.
His car hit a kerb, and the man tried to correct it about two metres from the water but lost control of the car, which propelled backwards onto the rock wall.
A bystander helped the man out of the car, uninjured, according to police.
Fire and Rescue personnel were concerned the car was leaking fuel into the river as the car was half submerged and the tide was rising.
South Coast Fire and Rescue Duty commander Inspector Kernin Lambert said there wasn’t a fuel leakage, but there was a danger that, because the fuel tank was wedged on sharp rocks, sparks could have been generated during the salvage operation.
“Any forward movement could have torn it (the fuel tank),” he said.
The officers built a ramp from timber blocks, and manoeuvred the car clear of the rocks so it could be towed out.
“We put fire protection in place because if it had ignited, it would have been a substantial fire,” he said.
“We weren’t taking any chances.”
Police said they interviewed the driver and were looking into taking further action.