A 59 year old woman from the city was killed and at least 38 other passengers suffered injuries after three government buses involved in a multiple collission on East Coast Road near Muttukadu boat club on Sunday afternoon.
The deceased, G.Lakshmi, a resident of race course road in Guindy was declared brought dead at the hospital.
Investigations revealed that two buses collided head on on the narrow bridge which led to another bus travelling towards puducherry ramming onto the bus. The accident happened around 2 pm. “Of the buses involved in the initial collision, one of the buses was travellingtowards Puducherry from Chennai and the other was coming towardschennai from Chidambaram,” a police officer said. The bus towards Puducherry was already on the narrow bridge, which facilitatesmovement of only one vehicle, when the other bus tried to get onto thebridge leading to the accident, the officer added.
Another government bus trailing the puducherry bus rammed onto the latter’s rear leading to a multiple collission on the narrow stretch.The foscile part of the buses involved in collision were completely damaged leaving the driver of the Chidambaram-Chennai bus, Manikandan seriously injured. The deceased, Lakshmi was also travelling on the same bus, police said.
Kelambakkam police and more than 10 ambulances, public and private rushed to the scene to rescue the injured passengers. Around 38 of them, including the drivers of the other two buses, Chandrasekar and Jothi were rescued and moved to government hospitals in Chennai, Chengalpet and private hospitals.
A majority of the injured were referred to the Government Royapettah Hospital. “Four of the patients- Ganesh (40), Anitha (23), Gunaboosham (59) and Govindaraj (29) had suffered grievous injuries on their limbs and were admitted. Around 20 of them were treated as out patients for their injuries,” a doctor at GRH told Express.
“Twelve passengers were admitted in various hospitals across the city with grievous injuries,” Kelambakkam Inspector Govindaraj said. Traffic was affected for more than two hours along ECR following the accident. Kelambakkam Police have registered a case and are investigating.