SEVERAL people were injured, thousands were left without power and there was chaos on the roads yesterday when high winds wreaked havoc across the county.

The injuries happened when hoardings surrounding Oxford's animal testing laboratory collapsed and gusts of 75mph were recorded at about 1pm.

Winds began to pick up at about 7am yesterday and four schools - Didcot Girls, Harwell Primary School, Chipping Norton School and Steventon Primary School - were all closed because of problems caused by the high winds.

By mid-afternoon Oxfordshire County Council had received more than 450 reports of fallen trees and flooding.

In the centre of Oxford, a section of a 12ft high metal and wood barrier was blown over by a gust of wind at about 1.15pm at Oxford University in South Parks Road.

Police closed off South Parks Road and Longwall Street and directed traffic down Oxford High Street as an investigation by the Health and Safety Executive was launched.

A 28-year-old man suffered cuts and a head injury, a 30-year-old woman who works at the university and a 28-year-old woman suffered broken cheekbones and another member of staff received a dislocated hip.

Animal rights protester Amanda Richards, 32, of SPEAK, was setting up a demo outside the University's animal testing laboratory when she heard the hoardings fall.

She said: "We heard screaming and we ran over the road and lifted the fence up so they could try and climb out.

"Somebody was waving underneath and the girl was screaming 'help me'. She was very distressed. She had a little bit of blood on her face and it had swollen up straight away.

"It wasn't until a bit later that we could see the man and he was lying on the floor and his leg looked very badly hurt."

A spokesman for Oxford University said: "It appears the wind sucked the hoarding out from the biomedical research facility. Why this happened is being investigated from a technical point of view."

Continued.....

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