Six people were badly hurt and several others had lucky escapes in a series of smashes on roads in the West Midlands and Staffordshire this weekend.

In Wolverhampton, a passenger had to be cut free from wreckage by firefighters after he suffered serious leg injuries in a crash on the A449 Penn Road yesterday evening.

Firefighters took more than an hour to release the injured man, believed to be in his 30s, from the damaged car after the accident at the junction with Pinfold Lane just before 6.30pm. He was taken to New Cross Hospital in Wolverhampton.

Both the woman driver of the Ford Focus he was travelling in and the driver of the British Gas van it was in collision with were uninjured.

Pinfold Lane and the Wolverhampton-bound carriageway of Penn Road were closed for 90 minutes while emergency services worked at the scene.

Also at around 6.30pm, an elderly couple had a narrow escape when their Ford Fiesta crashed into a lamp post in Birches Barn Road, Bradmore. The pair, thought to be in their 70s, were unhurt when their car knocked a bollard over before colliding with the post.

Elsewhere in the Black Country, a taxi driver was cut out of his wrecked cab after a two-car crash in Dudley on Saturday.

The taxi driver, who is thought to work for Beacon Taxis and be in his mid-40s, had just dropped passengers off at the British Queen pub in Eve Lane on Saturday night at around 8.30pm when the crash happened.

He was lifted out of the Toyota Avantis on a spinal board before being taken to hospital with neck injuries.

And at 9.30pm yesterday a car, believed to have been stolen from Cannock, crashed down an embankment in Dibdale Road, Milking Bank, Dudley. Firefighters found barrels of diesel in the back of the Toyota. A man was taken to hospital while two passengers in the car fled the scene.

In Cannock, a six-month-old baby had a lucky escape after a car ploughed into his parents’ house just moments after they loaded him into a car at the exact same spot.

A silver BMW smashed into the Cannock Road home of 28-year-old Tim Brown on Saturday morning causing extensive damage to the front of the house.

The male driver, who is believed to be aged in his early 20s with dark hair, fled the scene seconds after the crash at 11.10am on Saturday. Cannock Road was sealed off for a number of hours.

Also in Staffordshire a teenage boy was airlifted to hospital after his bike collided with a car in Derrington Road, near Derrington.

The 14-year-old suffered multiple injuries to his leg, arm and head in the accident at 3.25pm on Saturday. He was taken to Birmingham Children’s Hospital and the woman driver of the car, thought to be in her 40s, was taken to Stafford Hospital.

A 37-year-old woman suffered serious head and arm injuries when her silver Alfa Romeo ploughed into a wall in Cresswell Road, Hilderstone, near Stafford, at 7.15pm on Saturday. Firefighters freed her and a dog travelling with her from the vehicle.