Thirteen people have been taken to hospital following a crash involving a coach and a Tesco lorry in Cambridgeshire.

The collision took place on the A1 northbound carriageway between Little Paxton and Buckden at 5.30am this morning (Sunday).

The East of England Ambulance Service said it was on the scene within six minutes, adding: “Two patients were taken to Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge, and 11 patients were taken to Hinchingbrooke Hospital with minor injuries.

“A further 29 people were taken to a local reception centre in St Neots.”

The ambulance service initiated its major incident plan due to the potential number of patients involved, but this was stood down at just after 7.30am when all people involved had been transported away from the scene.

Two fire crews from St Neots and one from Huntingdon were also called to the scene.

Station Commander Callum Faint, Incident Commander, said: “The lorry was overturned and across the carriage way. Due to the impact both the driver and co-driver of the coach were trapped and all the other occupants were suffering various degrees of minor impact injuries.

“Owing to the large number of casualties, the ambulance service declared a major incident and triage was established at the scene. As a fire and rescue service we began supporting our colleagues with the large volume of casualties whilst simultaneously extricating the two casualties using specialist cutting equipment. None of the casualties are believed to have life threatening injuries.”

He added: “This was a very positive example of multi-agency working involving not only the emergency services but also local authority (for a place to move the casualties to), highways and Carillion, who have already begun in repairing the damaged barriers. Unfortunately there will be delays on the A1 whilst this is undertaken.”

The coach, travelling between London and Newcastle, had 47 people on board.