The company responsible for three-mile tailbacks on the Helston to Falmouth road this morning has been fined.

Cornwall Council has confirmed it has issued Vodafone, which is carrying out the roadworks near Longdowns, with a fixed penalty fine.

A council spokesperson said: "They should have made sure the traffic lights were manually operated during rush hour but failed to do so."

Delays of up to 30 minutes in solid traffic were experienced by some motorists on the A394 as they tried to get to work and school.

The problem was a pair of traffic lights cordoning off a small section of road just before Longdowns - surrounding just one mini digger.

One angry driver took to Facebook to complain: "Not a single workman, just a solitary digger. Unbelievable.

"I think they must be looking for oil the amount they dig this road up. Why can't they wait until 9am?"

As a result of the work, traffic was queued from the traffic lights as far back as Retanna in the Helston direction during the peak rush hour just before 9am.

Some drivers decided to find their own diversion to avoid queuing, taking to the surrounding back roads instead.

This caused further frustration, however, as the increased volume of traffic met each other on narrow bends and also faced large areas of floodwater on some of the lower lying ground.