Freak accident kills one, injures three

In a freak mishap, a 25-year-old man died, while three others suffered serious injuries, after they fell off from the airport flyover in Vile Parle. The accident occurred after a wooden plank from the truck the four were travelling in, broke after it hit the flyover’s boundary wall, on Saturday.

Police said that the victim fell from a height of around 40 feet. The deceased, Pankaj Kanade, was returning from Dharavi along with his friends — all members of Shiv Shakti Navratri Mandal in Jogeshwari east — after procuring an idol of Goddess Durga.

At least 40 members of the mandal were travelling in the truck. A few of them were leaning on the wooden plank on the left side of the truck. When the vehicle reached the flyover on the Western Express Highway, the driver took a sudden turn, making the truck’s side hit the flyover’s boundary wall.  The wooden plank broke due to the jolt and four of the members fell off from the truck and went straight down.

While Kanade died on the spot after falling on his head, Pramod Kumbhar, Prashant Jadhav and Suresh Panchalkar suffered multiple injuries. They were rushed to Cooper Hospital and are undergoing treatment. They were all residents of Sanjay Gandhi Nagar in Jogeshwari east.

The Vile Parle police have arrested the truck driver, Shamsher Alam Zameer Alam, 25, under section 304(a) (causing death by negligence) of the India Penal Code.