Commuters in Chennai had a narrow escape on Sunday afternoon after a portion of the Anna Salai, an arterial road, caved in near the Thousand Lights mosque. A state bus and a car were trapped in the sinkhole that formed, The Hindu reported. Thirty-five passengers who were on the bus were evacuated immediately. No one sustained major injuries.
The bus driver told the English daily that he felt like the air had gone out of the vehicle’s tyres before he realised that it was the road that had collapsed. The bus and the car have been pulled out and traffic on the busy road has been diverted. Vehicles moving towards DMS and Teynampet are being diverted via Royapettah Clock Tower, Lloyds Road, and Cathedral Road.
The cave-in took place while tunnel boring work for the Chennai Metro rail was being carried out between Thousand Lights and AG-DMS, the newspaper said. However, the Metro authorities said the cave-in was a result of loose soil. “The cave-in must have taken place owing to loose soil. We have tried our level best to tunnel below 20 feet so it doesn’t disturb the upper layer of soil. However, metro pipelines and other road construction work makes the soil loose,” The News Minute quoted Sruthi Ravindran, a Public Relations Officer associated with the Chennai Metro Rail, as saying.
The same stretch of the road had caved in on March 30.
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