A WOMAN claims she could have been killed when a fence was blown onto her in York - and has called for a full health and safety investigation into the incident.

Valerie Baldwin, 70, said the corrugated metal fence knocked her over and into the road in Layerthorpe, and she heard the crack as her head hit the road surface.

“Fortunately, the traffic lights nearby were on red and nothing was passing, or I could have fallen under a car, lorry or bus,” said Mrs Baldwin, from Hull, who was visiting York on a business matter and was walking along Layerthorpe when the accident happened.

“I’ve got a bump on my head but the paramedics said I would have suffered a much worse cut to the head had I not been wearing a woolly hat.

“I was taken to York Hospital and they said I would just suffer minor concussion but I was very, very lucky.

“There was also a lady pushing a pram with a baby in it, coming the other way, and she had only just got past the fence when it was blown down and narrowly missed being hit.”

She said that while she was being treated in an ambulance, she saw the fence being put straight back up, and she was concerned that it might blow down again onto someone else, with potentially more severe consequences.

She said that while it was windy when the fence blew down, it was actually just before a very squally hailstorm swept through York, as she remembered the hail starting to fall on her while she lay on the ground with the fencing lying on top of her.

She said the health and safety issues of the fencing needed to be looked into, and she had been to see a solicitor.

The fencing borders the construction site of a new Travelodge hotel which is being built off Layerthorpe by Tolent Construction.

A spokesperson for the the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) said: “HSE are aware of this incident and we are making initial inquiries.”

The Press approached Tolent for comment on Thursday morning but a spokeswoman was unable to come back with a comment by yesterday afternoon.