A 70-YEAR-OLDgrandmother died in a crash at an accident blackspot when the car driven by her husband hit a tree, an inquest heard.

Kathleen Mary Helen Thompson from Cwmbran was a passenger in a blue Vauxhall Insignia when it careered off the A40 at Whitchurch on Saturday, March 30, around 5.30pm.

The accident near the Daff-y-Nant services, happened just five months after a motorbike rider and a pedestrian collided and died on the dual carriageway near the same spot.

A vehicle inspector from West Mercia Police told the inquest at Hereford Coroners Court he had examined the car after the accident, which had been travelling at around 70mph, but had been unable to find any indication of what may have led to the crash.

Driver Colin Thompson said he had no memory of the accident.

The air ambulance and 999 services, including five fire engines, rushed to the scene and the road was closed for more than six hours while police investigated.

Assistant coroner for Herefordshire, Roland Wooderson, concluded that Mrs Thompson died from multiple injuries and trauma sustained from a ”quite dramatic” road traffic collision.

It was the third death on the same stretch of road in the last year.

An inquest in June heard that Whitchurch-based tattoo artist Thomas Wheeler, aged 34, and 29-year-old bike rider Robert Boyd from Walford died in a collision beside the service station shortly before 8pm on September 27, 2018.