Wednesday 2 November 2022 12:40 PM Screaming mother watched as daughter, 7, rode new bike into HGV in fatal crash, ... trends now
A screaming mother watched as her seven-year-old daughter cycled into a lorry outside her home in a crash that killed her, an inquest has heard.
'Bubbly' schoolgirl Eloise Jackson had only just learned to ride when she fatally collided with the wheels of a moving HGV metres outside her front door, a coroner was told.
Her devastated mother Laura Jackson told the hearing how she screamed and ran after Eloise as the youngster pedalled away from her down the hill and into the vehicle, which was loaded with 26 tonnes of plastic.
She said: 'Eloise hopped on her bike despite me telling her not to. I was yelling and screaming. I went to the end of the road and came face to face with a lady who said 'I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry'.
'All the traffic stopped and I started screaming for someone to call an ambulance.'
Eloise died in hospital later that evening.
Earlier this year, the Jackson family decided to leave Collingbourne Ducis in Wiltshire where they had lived for 14 years and relocate to Devizes - amid growing anger about the number of HGVs in their former picturesque village.
Calls to ban articulated lorries from the quiet roads surrounding their home in Collingbourne Ducis escalated following Eloise's death, with residents and the local MP calling for immediate action.
Keen horserider Eloise Jackson was pronounced dead at Salisbury District Hospital in July 2021
Collingbourne Ducis, which dates back to the Domesday Book and has a population of just 1,000, has seen a rise in recent years in HGVs 'thundering' through the tiny roads.
A petition calling for lorry re-routing and a new speed limit to protect the 'quintessentially chocolate box' area was launched in the wake of Eloise's death.
Philip Palmer, a close family friend who represented the Jacksons at the inquest, said the increasing volume of HGV traffic is 'totally inappropriate' for the types of roads in the area.
He said: 'The largest vehicle anticipated when these roads were made was a big horse and cart, not these six axle HGVs.'
He added that the area of road where Eloise died is an 'accident blackspot' which has seen other collisions - including a road fatality following a two-car crash in December 2020.
Eloise's family and friends hope that the new road safety campaign will be 'one of her legacies'.
Salisbury coroner's court heard that on the evening of July 13, 2021, Laura Jackson was walking alongside Eloise as she cycled on her green BMX - which she had only recently learned to ride during the Covid pandemic.
The pair were returning home from a recreation ground near their house, where Eloise lived with her mother, her father James, a shipping clerk, and her elder sister Anaiis, 11.
The road on which they lived, Church Street, is part of the A338 which links the A303 with Swindon via Marlborough.
In a statement, Mrs Jackson, who at the time ran her own baking business, told the inquest: 'The recreation field was just a two-minute walk away from our house. She was so happy riding on the recreation ground.
'I was always by her side but wanted her to be
