A HORSE that ran into the path of a car on the A127, injuring twopeople and causing traffic chaos, escaped from a traveller site just hours earlier, the Echo can reveal.

The animal was killed instantly when it was hit by a Renault Megane on the Southend-bound carriageway at the junction with the A132 at Wickford at about 8.35pm on Saturday.

The horse had escaped from Hovefields Avenue, where it was tethered at the junction with Hovefields Drive.

The crash left a 52-year-old woman trapped in her vehicle, while the male driver suffered minor injuries.

Jill Walsh, in her fifties, from Hovefields Avenue, said horses had escaped a number of times.

She said: “I am tired of some of the travellers in Hovefields not providing their horses with safe places to stay.

“I can’t recall the amount of calls neighbours have made to police about escaped horses in the last six months. Not all are even called in, as residents sometimes get them back in the field.”

She said the horse first escaped at around 5pm and police were called, but it was rounded up by its owners before they arrived.

She added: “Just before the accident, it was running up the lane and into one of the traveller pitches.

It came running out with a boy chasing it, then three cars shot off after it.”

The crash happened hours after another two horses were killed on the A127 after escaping near the Essex County Council-run Hovefields Caravan Park, in Courtauld Road, and colliding with traffic near Pound Lane at 6.17am.Aman had to be cut from a Nissan Micra with serious head injuries, while three more cars and a lorry crashed.

An Essex Police spokeswoman said: “We have traced the owner of the horse killed in the later accident, but no one has been arrested.

It is difficult to prove negligence was involved, but the investigation is ongoing.”

Police have been unable to trace the owner of the other horses.

She added that due to the large number of escaped horses and difficulties tracing owners, a new scheme was being launched across Basildon and Thurrock.

She said: “We are encouraging all horse owners to register details of their animals with us.”