More drivers have been caught speeding on the region’s roads during the four-day Easter long-weekend compared to last year but police are pleased with the result saying there were no major crashes.
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More targeted policing during Operation Tortoise has been attributed to 116 people being caught speeding in the Canobolas Local Area Command compared to 72 last year.
Macquarie Cluster Traffic and Highway Patrol acting cluster senior supervisor Sergeant Peter Foran said during Operation Tortoise police patrolled in the right areas at the right times to catch speeding drivers.
Sergeant Foran said there were 65 other road offences such as driving while disqualified in the Canobolas zone compared to 58 last year but there were only three people caught not wearing a seat belt on the weekend.
“We only saw one collision reported and that was only a minor collision with minor injuries, that reflected in Chifley command as well,” Sergeant Foran said.
“We are detecting in the right places and at the right times, the driver behaviour was pretty good.”
He said both highway patrol and general duties police conducted 3300 breath tests in the command on the weekend of which 1800 were conducted in Orange with four people exceeding the alcohol limit across the command.
Of the offences picked up in the Canobolas zone, Sergeant Foran said 54 people were caught speeding up from 31 last year, there were 27 other traffic offences down from 32 in 2016 and no one was caught not wearing a seat belt, compared to two last year.
Sergeant Foran said among those caught breaking the law in the Orange area was a 30-year-old Sydney man who was stopped for speeding on Burrendong Way at 4.15pm on Friday and his car was found to be uninsured and the driver was disqualified.
“Five minutes after police fined that motorist he was detected driving again,” he said.
On Saturday a female P-plater was charged with special range drink driving on the Northern Distributor.
On Sunday a man who’s driver’s licence was suspended earlier that day was stopped in the Orange area driving an uninsured vehicle and was arrested for a breach of bail.
Sergeant Foran warned drivers police will be out in force again this weekend through to the middle of next week.