A “speeding” car smashed through the concrete railing of a bridge in Ultadanga and landed on a cluster of shanties underneath early on Monday.
The 21-year-old man who was at the wheel survived the crash with relatively few injuries.
A father and his son, who were in one of the shanties on which the car fell, were injured in their sleep. They suffered leg injuries, for which they were taken to a hospital and were discharged after treatment.
The bridge, which connects VIP Road and Salt Lake, used to be ever busy before a flyover came up connecting the two arterial thoroughfares.
The Tata Nexon was heading from Lake Town towards Salt Lake when it crashed, police said.
Officers identified the man who was at the wheel as Sheikh Sohaib, 21, a resident of 2/H/3 Motijheel Lane in Entally. He was taken to the RG Kar Medical College and Hospital, from where he was discharged after treatment.
The father-son duo who were injured after the car crashed into their shanty at Sree Krishna Colony were Arabindo Sardar, 55, and Biswajit, 26.
The police said the car was registered in the name of Sohaib’s brother.
The mangled car was lifted by a crane and taken to Maniktala police station. The vehicle will undergo mechanical tests to ascertain whether it had developed
a snag that led to the accident.
Had it not been for the shanties, the car would have fallen about 15 feet.
“The car was moving at a very high speed. The airbags were deployed inside the car, which protected the driver from fatal injuries. Luckily, the two residents of the
shanty, too, did not suffer any critical injuries,” said an officer of Maniktala police station.
People in the neighbourhood said they heard a “very loud sound” and came out of their homes. The car was precariously hanging over the huts then.
“We dragged out the two men who were trapped inside their house,” said a resident of Sree Krishna Colony.
The man at the wheel was extracted out of the car by a team from the disaster management group and rushed to the RG Kar Medical College and Hospital. He was discharged from the hospital a few hours later, the police said.
The police said vehicles should not speed, especially on bridges and flyovers, and while negotiating bends.
In this case, too, the police suspect the car could not negotiate the speed at the bend and crashed through the concrete railing.
In 2013, a portion of the flyover that runs over the slip bridge from which the car fell on Monday had collapsed.
“In this case (Monday), the vehicle had crashed through the concrete railing at the bend of the bridge. In 2013, a portion of the flyover had collapsed on its own,” said a senior officer at the Kolkata police headquarters in Lalbazar.
The police have installed guardrails to cover the broken railing and tied bamboo poles as a makeshift arrangement to ensure that vehicles do not fall through the gap in the concrete railing.
A senior officer said Sohaib would be booked for rash and negligent driving and for endangering human lives.