Drunk soldier sped at 120mph on Tay Road Bridge

A Black Watch lance corporal who drunkenly drove at 120mph the wrong way across the Tay Road Bridge is facing jail.

Daniel McLean.

Daniel McLean raced across the wrong side of the dual carriageway before losing control and careering onto the middle of a roundabout at the other end.

Dundee Sheriff Court heard McLean averaged 93mph - with a female passenger he had gone into Dundee to pick up seeing the speedometer of his Honda Civic hit 120mph.

After he crashed through the roundabout at the Fife end of the bridge police discovered he was two and a half times the alcohol limit.

McLean faces being demoted back to the rank of private by the Army - as well as a possible jail sentence when he returns to court next month.

His lawyer said McLean had taken the wrong slip road on to the bridge and had decided to go as fast as possible to get across.

Fiscal depute John Adams said McLean had managed to make the journey from Dundee to Fife in just 54 seconds.

He said: “He missed the slip road on to the Tay Road Bridge and continued driving westwards before performing a U-turn and joining the north bound carriageway - effectively the wrong side of the bridge.

“Whilst there he realised that and as such made an attempt to cross the bridge as quickly as possible.

“The witness in his car saw the speedo, which indicated he was travelling at 120mph.

“At the end of the bridge he was travelling too fast to negotiate the roundabout and as such mounted it whilst braking.”

McLean, 24, of Dumfries, pleaded guilty on summary complaint to charges of drink driving and dangerous driving committed on the A92 Tay Road Bridge on June 21 this year.

Ian Houston, defending, said: “He is in the Army, 3 SCOTS, the Black Watch, and is a lance corporal.

However, he will be demoted to private as a result of this.”

Sheriff George Way deferred sentence until November for social work background reports and banned McLean from the road in the meantime.

He warned McLean: “The dangerous driving coupled with alcohol, the decision to put the hammer down and race across the bridge and then to lose control puts this beyond the sentencing powers I have today. I need background reports.”