M27: Tragedy after Southsea man dies behind the wheel after suffering medical episode
A man who crashed into a broken down car on the M27 near Portsmouth suffered a fatal medical episode, an inquest has heard.
Stephen Lee, 60, died on Friday, January 5, 2024, after his Nissan crashed into a broken down car on the M27 eastbound between Junction 11 and Junction 12.
The inquest, held in the city today (January 27), heard how Mr Lee, of Southsea, suffered a cardiac arrhythmia, resulting in him losing control of his car and subsequently crashing into a stationary vehicle on the hard shoulder.
An eyewitness account from Leon Morris was read out in the court. It said: “On Friday, January 5, 2024 at around 3.30pm I was travelling east on the M27 and I was travelling towards Farlington. A red light came up in my car to say it was over heating - I pulled over on the hard shoulder.
“I instructed my wife to get out of the car and stand behind the barrier - I checked under the bonnet that there wasn’t a fire and then also stood behind the barrier.”
Whilst waiting for a Green Flag recovery car, Mr Morris saw Mr Lee’s car ‘swerving’ across the M27 carriageway. He said ‘there was a van following the Juke and was driving in a way to slow the traffic behind down.’
Mr Lee’s car struck the back of Mr Morris’ vehicle on the hard shoulder and his car ended up on lane one of the motorway. The inquest heard how airbags had been deployed and the car was smoking which prompted Mr Morris and the van driver to move Mr Lee, who was ‘slumped over the wheel’, onto the hard shoulder.
Senior Coroner for Hampshire, Christopher Wilkinson said: “I suspect that from the dash cam footage, Stephen is quite unwell and not in control of the car.
“He probably lost control of his steering because it is likely that he had started to fall unconscious at the time of the crash.
“From the dash cam footage, Stephen started to experience some difficulty at 4.31pm and from that over the next four to five minutes his car dramatically swerves over the carriageway.”
Emergency services attended the collision and the inquest heard how a statement confirmed that Mr Lee did not sustain any major internal or external injuries as a result of the crash.
Mr Wilkinson said: “It seems to me that Stephen’s condition was critical but they provided advanced life saving techniques at the scene.
“As we know about 4.35pm was when this happened and they then worked with him for about an hour. Normally there is a protocol that resuscitation work is about 20 minutes so this is quite considerably longer than that.”
Following a post mortem, conducted by pathologist Dr Brett Lockyer, it was identified that Mr Lee suffered from emphysema (lung disease) and cardiomegaly which is an enlarged heart.
Mr Wilkinson added: “In effect, there are two things happening with Stephen, the thickening of the arteries which is a natural occurring condition which, over time, has caused the heart to work harder and the left side of his heart to become enlarged. The second thing is that his lung has not been functioning as it should do and that is equally put pressure on his heart.
“These two things put together are likely to cause sudden cardiac failure or it can cause cardiac arrhythmias so the heart has an irregular beating pattern and then it just stops.
“It is a combination of heart disease and lung disease that caused the issue here.”