The Chief Constable has said that failures that led to a TT racer suffering life-changing injuries during the 2018 event were outside police control.

In his report, Gary Roberts mentioned the Steve Mercer crash, which he referred to as ’tragic’.

Mr Mercer sustained life-changing injuries during the crash when a course car collided with his motorcycle while he was travelling back around the course to the grandstand in the wrong direction following the crash that killed rider Dan Kneen.

scene

Police officers were in the car, which was driven to the scene of the crash by a race official.

Mr Roberts said: ’Systemic failures outside the control of the constabulary led to the crash occurring and I look forward to improvement being made in time for the 2019 event.’

The report was written for Home Affairs Minister Bill Malarkey MHK and presented to him before this year’s TT.

Mr Roberts told the Examiner: ’One of the changes for this year was that if police officers had to go on the course, they went in a police car, under very tightly controlled conditions where we were absolutely assured by the organisers that nothing could possibly be moving.

’The very fact that the year before officers went on the course in a course car, when things were moving, shows that there were problems in the system. So the system involves those responsible for the running of the event.’