A DRIVER fractured his skull after leaping out of the a moving lorry when boiling oil began spraying out of a burst pipe.

The 38-year-old man, who has not been named, threw himself on to the road at Bells Lane, Hoo, near Rochester. The truck overturned.

He was taken to Gillingham's Medway Maritime Hospital where is now recovering.

The articulated lorry was carrying a cargo of melons. It took more than five hours to recover the vehicle.