Small plate more urgent than waterfall tragedy

A North Wales police officer on an emergency call to save a father and daughter who had plunged down a waterfall stopped to check a motorcycle number plate was regulation size.

Soraya Gallacher, three, and her father James, 35, died despite a frantic two-hour rescue bid after falling 50 feet into a deep pool at the foot of Nantcol waterfall in Llanbedr, near Harlech.

A company director told how a police car rushing to the scene turned around and stopped so an officer could run checks on his motorcycle.

Carl Myers, 43, said: “First I was passed from the opposite direction by an ambulance with sirens blaring, clearly on an emergency call. Then a police car passed heading the same way, flashing its lights.

“A few miles down the road I was surprised to see the same BMW police car again in my mirror with blue lights blazing.

“I stopped and the officer told me he had turned around because he believed the number plate on my Kawasaki ZX-10R did not conform to legislation.

“As he wrote me a ticket, about 15 minutes after I’d first seen him, a second patrol car passed with its blue lights and siren on, also clearly on an emergency call.

“The officer then calmly informed me the car was attending the emergency he had been responding to.

“When I asked what it was he said: ‘Two persons missing in a ravine. We have air support attending the scene, hoping to lift them out.’”

James was reportedly holding Soraya when he slipped at the beauty spot on July 18, prompting a huge search by police, ambulance crews, amateur divers, the fire service and RAF.

The girl was said to still be in her father’s arms when their bodies were pulled from the water.

Myers, from Wakefield, West Yorkshire, first saw the patrol car about 12 miles from the scene of the tragedy, on the A496 near Bontddu.

He received a £60 fixed penalty fine for having a number plate approximately 80mm shorter in depth than the minimum 178mm and consisting of a single row of digits instead of two. 

He said: “Okay, so I had a small number plate. I’ve changed it now. Is it really as important as saving lives?”

A North Wales Police spokesman said: “Officers are tasked with specifically talking to motorcyclists – advising them of their vulnerability and enforcing any offences disclosed.

“North Wales Police have the resources to deal with simultaneous critical incidents.”

He said officers dedicated every summer weekend to targeting bikers “because the number of motorcyclists killed or seriously injured in North Wales is so high”.

For more on this, including how the force is using hidden speed cameras and stopping hundreds of innocent riders every weekend, get MCN, on sale August 5.