With an increase in the number of accidents on the Pune-Mumbai expressway in the same pattern, with vehicles dashing dividers and crossing over to other side, the highway officials had decided to put German-made Brifen wire ropes to avoid such mishaps.
The Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC) sources revealed that they are planning to put up the Brifen wires on the entire 95-km long highway. Earlier, in March 2013, such wires were installed on a three-kilometre stretch on E-way, which cost them Rs88 lakh.
MSRDC chief engineer Arun Deodhar said, “We have installed these wires on trial basis on the stretch of 3 kilometres. A tender has been rolled out and now we are waiting for response for another stretch. Once we receive proper response, we will identify and cover another 14 kilometres.”
If these wires would have been installed by now, then the accident in which four people lost their lives could have been averted. The wire would have stopped the car from going into the other lane, the official claim.
In most of the cases, such accidents take place because drivers lose control over the vehicles, break lanes and cross the road divider. This rope can arrest the impact of the crashing vehicle. As commuters prefer to drive on high speed on e-way, hence they tend to lose control of the steering wheels and end up crossing the divider.
Accidents in 2012
December 24 : Two Marathi actors, Anand Abhyankar and Akshay Pendse, and the latter’s two-year old son Pratyush lost their lives when their car collided with a Tempo near Urse toll plaza
February 25: Business partners Ajit Lalwani and Prakash Salve lost their lives after Lalwani lost control of the car after crossing the Kamshet tunnel. The speeding car jumped the divider and crossed over to the opposite lane and collided with a van. The duo was travelling to Pune from Mumbai when the mishap took place
January 2 : A senior officer of Atlas Copco company VP Gopal died when his car jumped into the opposite lane while coming to Pune from Mumbai
January 1: Yerawada resident Nitin Kopikar lost his life while driving his car from Mumbai to Pune when he lost control over the vehicle and entered into the opposite lane and rammed into barricades installed on the stretch
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