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All decks awash - and the wrong type of tanker for these conditions. This was the scene at the rear of the Lucas factory in Hapton yesterday morning. It all happened in a matter of minutes yesterday morning " one minute the big fuel tanker with its load of 33000 gallons of fuel oil destined for the storage tanks of the Joseph Lucas factory at Hapton, was standing on the fifteen foot wide towpath at the rear of the works…and the next minute the vehicle was lying on its side in the canal. The driver, Mr Stanley Austin (30), of Alexandra Road Morecambe told a Burnley Express reporter “When I arrived at the factory from Heysham at about 8am, I parked the tanker near the storage tanks ready for coupling up to the intakes. I tried the rear door of the factory, but it was locked, so I walked round to the other side of the building. When I came back, there was the tanker in the canal. I just don’t know how it could have happened.” And there it was, lying on its near side in about four or five feet of water with the canal lapping about its bulk. An official of the owners of the vehicle, Gilbraith Tankers, of Accrington, told our reporter that he hoped the tanker would be emptied and raised that morning. He added that the fuel oil would be pressurised out, all 12.5 tons of it, before the 9.5 ton vehicle was craned out of the canal.