[binand]

Today it seems a bus rammed into an Innova in which two families were on a pilgrimage to Mookambika temple. This happened on the NH17 bypass of Calicut city. Three of a family are dead. Details are a bit hazy (only vernacular coverage so far).

I was in Calicut last weekend and had traveled on this bypass on my way from and to the airport; the utter recklessness of drivers on this road has to be seen to be believed.

[sandsun7]

Originally Posted by StarrySky

The death toll in the gas tanker accident has been rising with more people succumbing to burn injuries. The toll is now up to 7.

The toll has further risen to 8 as of today morning. there are around 5 more people whose condition is very critical with more than 80% burns! This is turning to be more tragic as days pass by.

[one-77]

Originally Posted by binand

Today it seems a bus rammed into an Innova in which two families were on a pilgrimage to Mookambika temple. This happened on the NH17 bypass of Calicut city. Three of a family are dead. Details are a bit hazy (only vernacular coverage so far).

I was in Calicut last weekend and had traveled on this bypass on my way from and to the airport; the utter recklessness of drivers on this road has to be seen to be believed.

We drive on that road almost every week, when we pick/ drop off my sister at her college in Calicut. It's one of the best roads in Kerala in terms of engineering. 25 km of great surface, banked curves, and long straight stretches. Most vehicles can hit their top speeds here in the early hours of the morning. But it's two-lane and has heavy traffic in the daytime.
Unfortunately, it is also one of the most accident-prone roads in the state. All sorts of vehicles do insane speeds on this by-pass. Soon after completion, the locals had held a series of protests here because many pedestrians, cyclists and bikers had been run over while crossing the road at small intersections, which the driver of a fast moving vehicles will fail to notice. This had led to many obstacle "speed-breakers" being put up on this road. But these were soon removed.
Another major reason for mishaps here are that local buses race each other and jump red signals.
The police who find this road a cash cow, however do nothing to rein in errant bus drivers. A police jeep is a permant fixture near the Kadavu Resort. They are content with stopping and fining car drivers for sun films, and crossing the 70 kmph speed limit. If only they were as enthusiastic about preventing accidents..

[StarrySky]

I read in the newspaper that the "bullet" portion of the gas tanker was thrown about 300m away from the accident spot due to the explosion. That caused a lot of damage to houses/property which were along these 300m. Another reason mentioned is that lot of people who were sleeping and woken up by the loud explosion did not know what exactly had happened and in panic ran straight towards the accident site from where fire was spreading fast.

[mayankk]

Anybody have any news on the HR55 cab that hit an auto on the barapullah flyover about 2 hours back.
It had turned turtle, and the glasses were popped out. The auto, on the other hand, came out looking like it was an abrams!

Also, another one on the aiims flyover, where an indica was parked on the loop turned around and completely bashed in.

[evilshantanu]

Just saw 2 min back, huge traffic at Mahadevpura red-light on ORR Bnagalore. Police getting an accidented Santro towed away, the accident doesn't look very bad, just the left fender has gone, but saw a lot of blood on the drivers side window and the steering wheel

[mpksuhas]

Originally Posted by one-77

But it's two-lane and has heavy traffic in the daytime.
Another major reason for mishaps here are that local buses race each other and jump red signals.
The police who find this road a cash cow, however do nothing to rein in errant bus drivers. A police jeep is a permant fixture near the Kadavu Resort. They are content with stopping and fining car drivers for sun films, and crossing the 70 kmph speed limit. If only they were as enthusiastic about preventing accidents..

A perfect example of myopic planning. The road is still fully not completed (Malaparamb section was just opened officially) however older section of same road planned to be widened to 4 lane.

Police with speed guns always have a set location, ie same with them across states I guess. Their only aim is to make some money dont have any regard for improving safety on road.

[darklord]

Tanker explosion: toll reaches 11

Nine more persons were battling for life with severe burns at different hospitals, police said.

The driver (surrendered today) apparently gave a statement that a goods vehicle overtook from his left side and this crowded him onto the divider.

[sunishsamuel]

Its unfortunate to see the toll rising. I would not be surprised if there was someone desperate to overtake from left, resulting in the accident. Reminds of the Karunagapally incident, i remember reports that a Wagon R had hit the tanker from the left, resulting in truck losing control on a wrong maneuver (?). Similar issues, and if that's the truth, people did not learn yet!

After the Karunagapally incident, I remember, a lot of press releases by the law makers and police along with inputs from engineers that mentioned there will be significant changes in enforcement of rules, i.e speed limits, fitness checks and driver training for heavy trucks that carry inflammable substance. (Have seen tankers carrying acid zig zag on the Kerala roads !)

Supposedly, these trucks carrying gas, should be equipped with a safety valve which

- should control the leakage of gas
- reduce the chances of explosion resulting in pressure variation following the impact/overturning of the capsule. I am not having thorough knowledge on this, pardon my ignorance. Are such safety measures in place and won't they work ?

Above all, i still pity the poor infrastructure situation of Kerala. Poorly designed with hardly any expansion in the last one or two decades. Kerala seems to be a classic case of infrastructure inversely proportional to the number of vehicles. (except Ernakulam, Ekm-Trichur highway which had so many issues to face) Everytime the issue of not expanding roads revolves around the fact of monetary compensation, relocation of the affected and toll payment. Not about the scientific and safety aspects of four-six laning of roads ! I would continue praying that accidents should not happen in future.

[binand]

Originally Posted by sunishsamuel

Its unfortunate to see the toll rising.

14, this morning.

Originally Posted by sunishsamuel

Supposedly, these trucks carrying gas, should be equipped with a safety valve

In this particular case, Malayala Manorama theorizes that the "bullet" portion of the tanker separated from the truck and scraped on the road, tearing away the valves from the body. There apparently are three sets of valves:

1. Supply valve, underside, used to fill stuff into the tanker,
2. Excess flow valve, underside, self-operated and used to control the flow in case of problems with the supply valve, and
3. Safety valves, top of the tanker.

Speculation is that both supply and excess flow valves of the tanker were crushed by impacting and scraping on the road.

Originally Posted by sunishsamuel

Above all, i still pity the poor infrastructure situation of Kerala. [...] Everytime the issue of not expanding roads revolves around the fact of monetary compensation, relocation of the affected and toll payment. Not about the scientific and safety aspects of four-six laning of roads !

I would say the highly partisan politicians of Kerala the root cause of the problem. Nobody, none of them, is interested in anything other than nurturing their own vote banks and filling their own pockets. The NHDP, the Hill Highway project are some of the casualties of this attitude.

Again, Manorama reports that IOCL also has some tough questions to answer. They have been dragging their feet on a dedicated LPG terminal at Ernakulam for years now.

Originally Posted by sunishsamuel

I would continue praying that accidents should happen in future.

[/quote]

Hope you missed a "not" in that one.

[sunishsamuel]

Originally Posted by sunishsamuel

I would continue praying that accidents should happen in future.

Kindly read the above as "I would continue praying that accidents should not happen in future. I am extremely sorry about the mistake, no bad intentions here. Thank you for pointing this out. Further, its really sad to hear that the death toll is rising in the accident. God be with all.

[arun_josie]

NICE Road, Bangalore - Near Hosur Road Toll, could be due to drowsiness .

[W.A.G.7]

Just back from a Mumbai trip today. Massive traffic jam from Hinjewadi flyover to nearly Pashankar auto/Oxford Nissan on the going towards Mumbai size. Reason - In the morning, a Hyundai container fell in the Mula river. It had happened a few minutes before I travelled towards Mumbai in the morning. While returning in the evening, I saw that they had managed to remove the truck with the help of cranes. But the entire side going towards Mumbai was blocked. Hopefully everything is cleared before tomorrow morning's office rush to Hinjewadi.

In the ghat also, saw 4 accidents in all. One totaled black i20 or Swift after Dutt snacks food mall, one rear ended maroon Santro also totaled. In the ghat section, coming towards Pune side, two trucks rear ended each other just before Amrutanjan point. Hence, huge traffic jam on the Pune side in the morning which fortunately had been cleared when I returned in the evening.

EDIT: Saw this disfigured Micra tailing us. It looks like a low speed crash, but still hard enough to dislodge the front bumper out of alignment.

[accentgiri]

Saw this accident in GST Road today while returning back from my native Trichy to Chennai around 3.30 PM (not sure about the time) near Villupuram.... the car was waiting for a tractor with 2 trailers to cross the road, lorry without applying brake, hit him in the rear left portion of the new SX4.... the owners of the car were waiting for the lorry owner to take decision whether to lodge complaint or to settle the matter...

First picture Lorry that has hit the car on its right hand side..
Second picture damaged car.... on its left side....
Third picture where the accident happened....

[funkykar]

Originally Posted by vikram_d

This has happened to one of our moderators also on an early morning drive. Luckily he was in a heavier car which didn't topple but did a full 360 degree rotation instead. There is a video of it somewhere on Youtube if I remember correctly.

Which was the heavier car?

Originally Posted by aadithsince1980

Got a link to the video? Would love to see it

I too would love to see the video