A MOTORCYCLIST was killed when his machine exploded in a crash with a horse and cart on a North Yorkshire road.

He was the second biker to be killed yesterday on the county's roads, and the third to die during the Bank Holiday weekend.

The latest accident happened on the A162 Sherburn-in-Elmet bypass, near the South Milford roundabout.

Sergeant John Settle said he had never seen an accident like it in his 26 years as a police officer.

Little was left of the motorcycle after the explosion, while debris from the wooden cart was scattered over a wide area.

The horse bolted after the accident and was believed to have escaped unhurt.

The driver of the horse and cart was taken to Pontefract General Infirmary suffering from shock, but was otherwise uninjured.

The biker has not yet been named by police, but he was said to be in his 30s and from West Yorkshire.

The bypass was closed all night after the crash, which happened at about 9.30pm yesterday, and was not expected to reopen until midday today.

Police said the horse and cart was travelling south along the bypass and the motorcycle in the opposite direction when the crash happened.

Sgt Settle said: "There was a considerable impact. The motorbike almost completely disintegrated and the trailer, which was made out of some substantial timber, shattered."

Police have appealed for anyone who saw the crash, or either vehicle before it happened, to phone 01904 669884.

At about 10.15am yesterday a male biker - again from West Yorkshire - died after a collision with a silver-coloured cattle trailer on an unclassified road between Greenhow and Blubberhouses, near Harrogate.

The trailer was being towed by a white Vauxhall pick-up truck. Any witnesses to that crash, are asked to phone 01423 539726.

On Saturday, 38-year-old Scarborough man Jonathan Stokes died after his motorcycle was involved in a collision with a car on the A171 between Whitby and Scarborough.

The three deaths mean that five motorcyclists have been killed on North Yorkshire's roads this year.

Inspector Chris Charlton, who led a Bank Holiday Weekend crackdown on irresponsible motoring, said: "We are doing everything humanly possible and our efforts will continue. It is very difficult to measure a weekend's policing in terms of success or failure, it is a whole season-long effect we are trying to achieve."

Police are desperate to avoid the road carnage of 2003, when 28 bikers and pillion passengers died in North Yorkshire.

A man was taken to the Friarage Hospital, Northallerton, with neck and shoulder injuries after an accident involving two HGVs and a tractor on the A19 between South Kilvington and Borrowby at about 7.30am today.

Updated: 10:38 Tuesday, May 04, 2004