Overloaded truck damages bridge; road communication between Bogura, Sariakandi snapped

Road communication between Bogura and the flood-affected Sariakandi upazila remained snapped since this morning after an overloaded cement-carrying truck damaged a bailey bridge in Bogura's Gabtoli upazila.

The bridge fully collapsed while the truck carrying 750 bags of cement was crossing it over the Barungi Beel around 8:00am, said Ashrafuzzaman, executive engineer of the Roads and Highway Department (RHD) in Bogura.

The truck remined stuck one side of the broken bridge, he said.

The bailey bridge can only take 15 tonnes of load but the truck was carrying almost 47 tonnes, our Bogura correspondent reports quoting Ashrafuzzaman.

"We are preparing to file a case against the truck owner and it's driver with Bogura's Gabtoli Police Station in this connection," said the executive engineer.

Sariakandi upazila is now a severely flood-hit area and over 2.5 lakh people use the bridge to reach Bogura town, reports our correspondent.

Mazedur Rahman, a reporter of a private TV channel, said, he wanted to go to Sariakandi this morning, but could not go as the bridge collapsed.

Ashrafuzzaman further said "we need minimum 3-5 days to repair the bridge."

The authorities will invite a tender of Tk 8 crore to build a new 22 metre RC (Reinforced Concrete) bridge there as the old bridge was risky, he added.