{"id":59285,"date":"2026-08-23T19:26:44","date_gmt":"2026-08-23T19:26:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/pcs-killed-in-wrong-way-a66-crash-were-heroes-say-families\/"},"modified":"2026-08-23T19:26:44","modified_gmt":"2026-08-23T19:26:44","slug":"pcs-killed-in-wrong-way-a66-crash-were-heroes-say-families","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/pcs-killed-in-wrong-way-a66-crash-were-heroes-say-families\/","title":{"rendered":"PCs killed in wrong-way A66 crash were heroes, say families"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Two police officers who died when a car travelling the wrong way down a dual carriageway crashed into their vehicle have been hailed as heroes by their families.<\/b><\/p>\n

PC Tom Clough, 38, and PC Matthew Blades, 37, died when a Volkswagen Passat, which officers had been pursuing until seconds before<\/a>, collided with their marked armed response car on the A66 near Middlesbrough on Saturday.<\/p>\n

The Passat’s occupants Michael Robert Cahill, 23, Jacob Matusiak, 23, Theo Rae, 17, Makai Saddington, 18, and Cole Robert Worthy, 17, also died.<\/p>\n

In tributes released by Cleveland Police, PC Clough’s family said he was “willing to help anyone”, while PC Blades’ wife described him as “loved beyond words”.<\/p>\n

“No words will ever feel like the right words to honour our Matt,” she said, adding he was a “beloved husband” and the “most devoted father” to their two young sons who would grow up knowing what an “incredible” dad he was.<\/p>\n

“He gave his life in the line of duty, protecting and serving others with courage, dedication and selflessness,” she said.<\/p>\n

“The pain of losing him is beyond words, and our lives will never be the same.<\/p>\n

“Neither will the love he gave us ever fade.<\/p>\n

“He may have left this world committed to the duty he believed in, but his greatest legacy will always be the love he gave to his family.”<\/p>\n

He was “forever our superhero”, she added.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n


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Two police officers who died when a car travelling the wrong way down a dual carriageway crashed into their vehicle have been hailed as heroes by their families. PC Tom Clough, 38, and PC Matthew Blades, 37, died when a Volkswagen Passat, which officers had been pursuing until seconds before, collided with their marked armed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":59286,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[16415,327,259,13999,325,16429,16430],"class_list":["post-59285","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uk","tag-a66","tag-crash","tag-families","tag-heroes","tag-killed","tag-pcs","tag-wrongway"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59285","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=59285"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59285\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":59287,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59285\/revisions\/59287"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59285"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59285"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}