Balestier Overhead Bridge disappears overnight; 2 men arrested for crashing trailer into bridge

The overhead bridge along Balestier Road that was damaged on Friday night after a trailer carrying a distended excavator crashed into it has been completely dismantled and removed from the site.

Land Transport Authority said on their Facebook page that the structural integrity of the bridge was compromised and thus the bridge’s beams were removed for safety reasons.

Recovery works were ongoing throughout the night of the incident, with two heavy duty cranes being used to dismantle and remove the bridge’s beams.

Meanwhile, two men were arrested in connection to the accident. Singapore Police Force reported that it had arrested the 57-year-old driver and his 59-year-old employer for Causing a Heavy Motor Vehicle to Collide with an Overhead Bridge. This charge is in accordance with the Road Traffic Act.

The driver’s driving licence has also been suspended.

“I heard a very loud noise – first it was like a loud bang, and then the sound of metal on stone. I think the truck was driving at average speed, wasn’t…speeding

“I turned to the right … and saw that the bridge was moving a bit and then the truck stood still. The driver ran out of the car and was definitely in a deep shock.”

This is not the first time that vehicles carrying excavator or crane arms have crashed into overhead bridges.

Just last year, a lorry crane driver was arrested after the crane arm he was transporting collided with the overhead bridge between Marina Square to Millenia Walk, on 22 February.

Another lorry transporting an excavator crashed into a bridge near Upper Thomson Road in July 2015.

In 2011, a man was arrested after a crane arm he was transporting along Pan-Island Expressway collided onto a bridge. Part of the crane arm dislodged and fell onto a car carrying a family of three who were rushed to the hospital.

Another woman in her 50s was injured in 2010 when another lorry carrying a crane crashed into a bridge near Sixth Avenue. The woman fell and injured her elbow after the impact punched a hole in the bridge.

Back in 1997, a rubbish truck driver was hospitalised after the truck he was driving dangled at an overhead bridge along Clementi Road when he crashed into the bridge with a crane that was taller than the height limit of the bridge.

https://theindependent.sg.sg/crane-crashes-into-overhead-bridge-at-balestier-road/