A WELDER who crashed his car on an icy stretch of road died from natural causes, an inquest heard.

Andrew Bohdan, of Marsden, died after his Citroen Saxo and a blue Lexus crashed shortly in the morning of December 1 last year.

Police crash investigators confirmed that the collision was caused by a patch of ice at Ing Head Road in Slaithwaite.

Mr Bohdan, 43, was taken to Huddersfield Royal Infirmary, but died later.

Yesterday an inquest at Huddersfield Coroner’s Court heard that he had died from natural causes.

Coroner Roger Whittaker said: “He had been in a traffic collision shortly before he died and he was one of the drivers.

“But his death was caused by natural causes and not influenced by the road traffic incident.”

Popular Mr Bohdan, of Woods Avenue, was a keen motorcyclist and well-known in the biking community.

On the morning of December 1, the married man’s car was involved in a head-on collision with another vehicle.

The inquest heard that he got out of the car after the crash but collapsed moments later.

Mr Whittaker said: “He had been involved in a road traffic collision but was alert and responsive following the collision.

“He was looking at the car to inspect the damage, but had chest pains and shortness of breath and collapsed.

“He was resuscitated but had a further arrest and could not be resuscitated a second time.”

A post mortem examination revealed that Mr Bohdan had used cannabis a number of hours before his death, but this was unlikely to have affected him at the time of the crash.

He died after suffering from a pneumothorax, a spontaneous medical condition where air is trapped next to a lung, which led to him going into cardiac arrest.

Mr Whittaker recorded that Mr Bohdan’s death was natural and not as a result of the crash.

Following Mr Bohdan’s death concerns were raised by residents about gritting in the stretch of road.

One resident of Hall Ing Road described the icy stretch as an ‘accident waiting to happen’ and said traffic had been losing control there leading up to the incident.

Some claimed gritting in the area had not been adequate since JB Schofield & Sons – the company which had gritted Colne Valley roads for 33 years – gave up the contract.

But Kirklees Council claimed the gritting policy was exactly the same.