M62 drivers faced an added hazard over the festive period - a falling wardrobe in the middle of the motorway.

The furniture which fell on to the motorway on Christmas Eve was among more than 4,000 incidents dealt with by traffic officers over the festive period.

Highways England (HE) responded to 4,281 reported issues from December 24 to January 1 - equivalent to about one every three minutes.

The incidents included the wardrobe falling from a car on to the M62 near Leeds, a large pothole caused by flooding on the same motorway near Rochdale, and a lorry fire on the M1 close to Milton Keynes.

The Rochdale pothole was originally thought to be a sinkhole, caused by the terrible weather.

A stretch of the M62 was shut for many hours after a 20ft sinkhole opened up into the road causing traffic chaos.

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It closed the the road between junction 20 and 19 of the westbound carriageway near Rochdale, and caused long hold-ups for drivers.

It is thought the sinkhole was caused by a change in temperature along with extreme weather which saw around a month of rain fall in just a few hours.

Some 1,721 broken-down vehicles, 604 collisions, 55 flooding issues and 21 fires were responded to by HE, which runs England’s 4,300-mile motorway and major A-road network.

December 30 was the busiest day, with 591 incidents, while Christmas Day was the quietest at just 278.

HE director of customer operations, Melanie Clarke, said: “Our traffic officers do a fantastic job of keeping the motorways moving 24 hours a day and Christmas was no exception.”

The officers work alongside the emergency services to manage incidents by reducing congestion, clearing debris and re-opening carriageways.