Highways England has announced the M20 has fully re-opened.

It was planned that major works on a stretch of the motorway between Junctions 2 (Wrotham) and 4 (Leybourne) wouldn't be complete until 6am tomorrow.

However, more than 100 engineers and contractors have finished ahead of schedule.

The work followed the incident last Saturday when part of a footbridge collapsed onto the road after being struck from below.

Speaking this lunchtime, a spokesman for the agency said closures on the M20 and M26 were being lifted.

And additional work, including road resurfacing and maintenance, has been carried out.

Since Friday night, 4,200 man hours had been spent working on the motorway.

The remaining section of bridge was demolished yesterday and today a fleet of trucks took away an estimated 400 tonnes of rubble.

As well as safely removing the footbridge, workers carried out routine maintenance.

This included 10,000sq metres of resurfacing, around five miles of new surface.

The agency's chief highways engineer, Catherine Brookes, said: “We’re proud of what we have achieved and that we have been able to safely remove the remaining structure and re-open early.

"This is good news for drivers wishing to use the M20 and M26.

"To reduce further disruption for road users, we also took the opportunity while the motorway was closed to complete some other extra work.

“We would ask drivers to remain patient while we complete the reopening.”