18 killed in truck accident on Pune-Satara highway
At least 18 people were killed and 14 others injured after a truck packed with labourers and heavy equipment hit a barricade and overturned on the PuneSatara highway in Maharashtra early on Tuesday, the police said.
The deceased, mostly construction workers from Bijapur district in Karnataka, were heading to Pune from Satara when the truck crashed around 4:30 am.
The injured have been admitted to the civil hospital in Satara. The condition of three of the injured labourers was reported to be critical, a police official said.
“At the turn on the spot, there is a slope. I suspect the driver lost control and drove into the safety wall along the slope. The tempo fell some 8-10 feet off the road,” said assistant police inspector Randive of Bhuins police station under Satara police jurisdiction.
There are no eyewitnesses and there are no surveillance cameras on the stretch of the highway.
“We will speak to the survivors who are in a state of trauma... But it is quite apparent that had the driver made even a little bit of attempt to prevent the collision, he could have prevented the loss of life. The safety wall could have prevented the tempo from turning,” said Amol Tambe, SP, Highway Safety Patrol.
PUNE:
Two persons died while four were injured after a fully-loaded container rammed into a stationary luxury bus near Charoti, Dahanu on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad highway on Tuesday.
According to API Jayprakash Gute of Kasa police station, the bus was coming from Amreli in Gujarat and was proceeding towards Khetwadi in Mumbai, when the front tyre of the bus developed a puncture near Charoti, and driver parked the bus on the side to replace the tyre. Suddenly, the container, driven by Ramesh Bariya, 45, rammed into the bus from the rear end.
“As a result, Bariya died and Madhuben Solanki, 65, a bus passenger who was sitting in the rear section of the bus died on the spot, while four other passengers sustained injuries and were admitted to the government hospital. One of the injured is being shifted to a Mumbai hospital,” said Gute.
RAM PARMAR
DAHANU: