A car approached Saltaire Roundabout at a “ridiculous” speed seconds before it hit a motorcycle, fatally injuring its 58-year-old rider, a jury heard.

Eyewitness Jacqueline Collier told Bradford Crown Court she knew there was going to be a collision.

“It was one of those slow- motion moments. You can see the car coming, you can see the motorbike coming, you know what’s going to happen and there’s nothing you can do about it,” Mrs Collier said.

She told a jury yesterday she was driving from Bradford with her husband at 10.30pm on Sunday, September 5, last year when they saw the crash.

She stopped at the roundabout after seeing a car approaching fast along Saltaire Road.

Mrs Collier said she turned to her husband and said: “That is a ridiculous speed to approach a roundabout.”

She then saw the motorcycle travelling on the roundabout within the speed limit, she said.

The car hit the bike and carried on up Moorhead Lane for some distance before stopping.

Stephen Rawlinson, 26, of Upper Grange Avenue, Allerton, Bradford, denies causing Nigel Earnshaw’s death by dangerous driving.

Mr Earnshaw, from the Keighley area, who was travelling to work a night shift at Hallmark Cards in Bradford, died in hospital 18 days after the collision.

Mrs Collier said the crash happened almost right in front of her vehicle.

The car struck the bike with such force that it and its rider flew up in the air and both somersaulted.

She said when the machine hit the ground she was surprised it did not break into pieces.

Mrs Collier and her husband jumped out of their car, phoned 999 and ran to help the motorcyclist.

Rawlinson, who was travelling to see his grandmother, told the police he failed to see the bike.

He pulled up in his Ford Focus afterwards, called the emergency services and walked back to the crash scene.

He told an officer he first thought the impact noise was children throwing a stone at his car.

The trial continues.