A bin lorry driver crushed a colleague to death by tipping his truck over while going round a corner too quickly, a court heard this morning.

Gerald Ball, 51, flipped the heavy vehicle on its side and crashed through metal barriers on to a dual carriageway.

One of his binmen, Kazys Kaniauskas, who lived in Barking, was killed when he fell out of the window and on to the road, jurors at Snaresbrook Crown Court were told.

Prosecutor James Dawes said it was “sheer good fortune” that no other vehicles collided with the truck as it ploughed on to the North Circular in Chingford on September 9, 2014.

Snaresbrook Crown Court heard the three loaders in the truck were not wearing seatbelts as they were used to constantly getting in and out to empty bins.

When the lorry flipped over, the bin loaders all fell against the left hand door of the vehicle.

Police, emergency services and an air ambulance attended the incident but Mr Kaniauskas was pronounced dead barely an hour later at 9.26am.

The court heard that the crew were driving towards a tip when the accident happened.

Mr Dawes claimed Ball should have known his truck would be harder to stop and had a higher centre of gravity because it was loaded.

Mr Dawes told jurors: ‘Only a person whose driving fell far below that of a competent and careful driver would tip over a refuse truck.

‘It would take some effort to tip over a refuse truck – you would have to take a 90 degree turn far too fast.”

Ball, of Hazel Way, Chingford, has admitted causing death by careless driving but denies the more serious charge of causing death by dangerous driving.

The trial continues.