Two breakdowns cause 5-hour jam on Mumbai-Pune Expressway

Pune: A cargo trailer got stuck under Amrutanjan Bridge on the Mumbai-Pune Expressway while another broke down near it, due to which there was traffic chaos on Friday morning. The jam was resolved after five hours.

The incidents on the route to Mumbai led to chaos on the expressway

The ongoing summer vacation and the weekend added to the traffic on the Expressway on Friday. An Expressway control official said, "Around 8 am, a cargo trailer heading to Mumbai from Pune got stuck under the Amrutanjan Bridge, due to which there was chaos on one of the lanes. Soon another trailer broke down. One-and-a-half hours later, a crane was brought to release the trailer. "With the help of a gas cutter and the crane, we released the trailer from the lane. This lane on the Pune-Mumbai side was disturbed for more than 5 km, and around 11 am, as the traffic was worse, we diverted light vehicles on the route to Lonavla via the old Pune-Mumbai Highway."

Gurunath Sathelkar and his daughter were going to Pune for her examination and managed to reach just before it

Caught in a jam
Landscape and gardening businessman Gurunath Ramchandra Sathelkar (51), a resident of Khopoli said, "My daughter Pooja is pursuing final-year civil engineering in a Wagholi-based engineering college, and on Friday at 2 pm, she was to take her examination. Her hall ticket had some error due to which I was travelling to Pune via the Expressway with her and got stuck in traffic. My daughter was worried about her examination and hall ticket and so was I. Later, we communicated to her professors that we were stuck. We managed to reach an hour before her examination in Pune."

Advocate Bhaskar Jagdale who was caught up in the jam missed his appointment at Mantralaya

Lonavla-based developer Chetan Balsara (32) said, "I had a land deal meeting in Andheri around 11 am followed by a dentist's appointment in Andheri around 1 pm. But I got stuck in traffic due to which my meeting had to be postponed by two hours."

Balsara added, "The worst part on the Expressway is that despite there being frequent vehicle breakdowns at Amrutanjan ghat, the crane takes one hour to reach the spot. Why don't the authorities learn a lesson from past incidents? It's always time consuming when there is a breakdown or an accident at such spots."

Another passenger missed his appointment with a minister due to the chaos. Advocate Bhaskar Jagdale a resident of Pune said, "I had work in Mantralaya on a water and land issue with a minister. I also had another appointment about a prison inmate. The minister's appointment was at 10 am. Due to traffic, I was late by one-and-a-half hours. Later, I had to wait for five hours till the minister was free from his other appointments. I had planned to come back to Pune around 3 pm and approach the prison with the letter from Mantralaya, but that did not work out. Now I have to wait till Monday for the process."