SIDDIPET: In a tragic incident, the efforts to rescue the driver of a lorry that got washed away in the floodwater went in vain, resulting in the death of the man. The deceased person has been identified as Mudigonda Shanker, 35, a resident of Kashireddy village in Adilabad district. The incident happened at Baswapur village in Koheda mandal on Saturday.
According to sources, the lorry was moving towards Siddipet from Husnabad. When the vehicle reached Baswapur bridge, which was by then inundated, at around 4am, the driver attempted to wade through the floodwater to reach the other side. However, as the stream was in spate, the lorry got washed away.
ALSO READ | Monsoon batters Telangana, alert sounded
Though the cleaner of the vehicle, Dharmaiah, escaped unhurt, Shanker couldn’t. Meanwhile, Shanker tried to save himself by jumping out of the sinking truck and latching onto a tree. A few local residents who learnt about the incident from Dharmaiah reached the spot and immediately contacted the local officials, who in turn informer Finance Minister T Harish Rao.
The Minister immediately directed the District Collector and Police Commissioner to carry out a rescue operation to save Shanker, as per which Commissioner of Police (CP) Joel Davis, along with his team, reached the spot. Meanwhile, special rescue teams were called from Hyderabad and Warangal. At the same time, the locals also took it upon themselves to save the lorry driver and took initiatives using a rope.
Meanwhile, considering the strong currents, the officials concerned called for a chopper to rescue the marooned man. However, it could not arrive due to unfavourable weather conditions. The driver disappeared in the floodwater by around 10am. When Express interacted with a few officials and locals, they all admitted that Shanker could have been saved if the chopper had come on time.
Though the officials called for the chopper at around 8am, the operators couldn’t start immediately due to bad weather. According to sources, the chopper arrived only after he disappeared. Speaking to Express, Husnabad ACP P Mahender Reddy said: “Both the police and locals tried a lot to save the man — us, including the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) teams, from one side of the stream and the locals from the other. The weather conditions were against us.
He disappeared after some time.” Meanwhile, though the special rescue teams and NDRF teams started searches to recover Shanker’s body, it has not been found yet. The chopper has also been deployed to search for his body as the Baswapur waters flow towards Shanigam project. Shanker’s family was informed about the incident and they also reached the spot later.