RAMANATHAPURAM
About 25 passengers and the crew of a Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation bus escaped unhurt as the vehicle, proceeding to Rameswaram from Madurai, crashed into the handrails of Pamban road bridge on Wednesday.
The bus has almost crossed the bridge when the driver lost control of the vehicle after applying brake to avoid collision with an oncoming vehicle, and crashed into the handrails near the check-post on the Pamban side. Police said no one was injured in the accident.
On Tuesday night, about 12 pilgrims from Coimbatore escaped unhurt when the driver of their van lost control of the vehicle and hit the elevated footpath on the bridge on the Mandapam side, the police said.
On Wednesday, the local youth ‘celebrated’ the 100th accident on the bridge since the National Highways laid mastic asphalt mixture surface in April to highlight the dangerous condition of the road surface.
They cut a huge cake on the bridge and distributed it to road users in a bid to draw the attention of NH officials to the slippery condition of the road on the bridge and alert road users to limit the speed.
After the mastic asphalt mixture surface was laid at a cost of about ₹1.10 crore, the bridge witnessed frequent accidents. The Chief Engineer of National Highways inspected the bridge a fortnight ago, after which the authorities decided to replace the surface with a bituminous concrete layer.
Pending estimate clearance from National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), the NH removed the mastic asphalt surface in the middle of the bridge, which served as navigational span, and replaced it with a bituminous concrete layer. Replacing the mastic asphalt surface from two sides of the navigational span of the 2.345-km-long bridge is yet to be taken up.