A man is fighting for his life after a stolen car being driven on the wrong side of road smashed into a lamp-post.

The crash happened at 12.10am on Saturday as a Vauxhall Astra was travelling west on the eastbound carriageway of Kingsway in Hove. The driver lost control and the car hit a lamp-post in the central reservation near the junction of Kingsway and Grand Avenue.

The car flipped over and landed on its roof. The driver was flung into the road by the impact. The 23-year-old man suffered serious head injuries and was taken by ambulance to the Royal Sussex County Hospital, Brighton.

Hours earlier, at 8pm on Friday, a pick-up truck towing a BMW car smashed into a speed camera at Marine Parade in Kemp Town on Brighton seafront, sending debris flying onto the pavement. The truck flipped over several times, but the driver escaped with minor injuries.

Pedestrian Rebecca Pyper, 25, of Marine Square, said: "There was a lot of traffic and cars were swerving to avoid the van. It is lucky no one was killed."

On the A27 at Firle, a man was killed and three men injured when their Ford Escort car hit a badger early yesterday. A police spokesman said: "After the collision with the badger, the driver lost control of the vehicle and it rolled on to a grass verge on the opposite side of the road."

A Renault Megane travelling in the other direction then struck the wreckage of the Ford Escort, lost control and rolled onto the other grass verge. The spokesman said one of the men in the Escort was pronounced dead at the scene and the other two were taken to the Royal Sussex County Hospital, Brighton, in a serious condition.

The driver of the Megane suffered minor injuries and was taken to the same hospital.

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