Death-defying motorist walks away from 'crumpled car' with just a broken rib

Traffic chaos descended on Dartford following the five-vehicle pile-up at 11.35am on October 24.

A white Volkswagen Golf was sucked underneath an HGV lorry at junction 31 of the M25 anti-clockwise before crashing into a second lorry - destroying the car completely.

Paramedics from the East of England Hazardous Response Team (HART) were called to the crash, involving three HGV lorries, a Volkswagen Golf and a Peugeot 206.

Paramedic, Graham Waeham said: "He is a very, very lucky man.

"Amazingly when we arrived he had got himself out of the car and had just suffered a broken rib.

"His car had hit one lorry, gone underneath another lorry, been spat out and hit another lorry again.

"His car crumpled around him - he is very lucky."

The aftermath of the smash saw roads around the scene jammed up for nine hours as Essex Police closed the Dartford Tunnel.

Rush-hour commuters faced queues stretching back to junction five of the M25 at Orpington and at its junction with the M26 and the A21.

All lanes were eventually re-opened at around 2.10pm but there were still huge delays tailing back as far as junction two at Bluewater until after 9pm.

Motorists took to Twitter to voice their anger at the jams.

Tim Aspeling said: "T'wife left Handcross at 17:00....they just got through Dartford tunnel nearly 3 hours later #NightmareTraffic."

Lee Carter, expressed her frustration over a seven mile journey from Dartford to Wellking which took two hours due the accident.

She tweeted: "Took two hours to drive from Welling to Dartford because of the Dartford Tunnel accident."

Robbie Reid added : "Dartford at a standstill as usual, taken me two hours to go five mins up the road #m25problems."

Drivers in Swanscombe and Greenhithe were also caught up in the nightmare with tailbacks hitting the High Street in Swanscombe causing delays of over an hour