Lucky escape for travellers in 4-bus smash on highway near Chittoor district

Tirupati: Ib a freak accident four buses collided on the highway near Chandragiri of Chittoor district on Friday.

First, a private travels bus, on its way to Bengaluru from Vijayawada, hit a Tamil Nadu state road transport corporation bus that was on its way to Tirupati from Salem. As the bus stopped suddenly, RTC bus moving behind the Tamil Nadu bus rammed into it.

Another RTC bus lost control when its driver tried to avoid running into people who were getting down from the Tamil Nadu bus. This bus swerved into the agriculture fields adjoining the highway.

The passengers had a narrow escape with minor injuries. The highway was blocked for hours near Chandragiri.

Later, the police cleared the traffic and took the private travels’ driver into custody and interrogated him. The quick braking and evasive action taken by other drivers prevented a major mishap.

The road where the accident took place is one of the dangerous spots of Chittoor. But in this case, overspeeding is the main cause of the mishap, as per the police department. A four-lane road is proposed between Tirupati and Chittoor, replacing the existing two lanes.

District collector P.S. Pradyumna has also instructed the national highway authorities to complete this stretch as earlier as possible, in a review meeting last month.

It may be recalled collector Pradyumna, in a recently-held road safety review meeting, had said Chittoor district stood first in the state in maximum number of road accidents. Several recommendations have been suggested by the road safety committee to prevent accidents in the district.