Onlookers converge on the Howard Cooke Highway in Montego Bay on Tuesday morning, shocked to see an International trailer sitting on top of a Toyota Corolla motor car. The truck was hit in its right side by the car, which lost control after it punctured a tyre. - Janet Silvera photo

Janet Silvera,Senior Gleaner Writer

WESTERN BUREAU:

The National Works Agency (NWA) is to conduct repairs to the Howard Cooke Highway in Montego Bay, St. James, following an accident on Tuesday in which an International trailer overturned on a Toyota Corolla motor car.

The Toyota Corolla had lost control when its left front tyre was punctured by one of several bolts protruding from the middle of the busy thoroughfare.

Miraculously, the driver of the car, Const. Jason Hamilton, attached to the Montego Freeport Police Station, and who had just left his workplace a few chains away, got out of the vehicle unscathed.

A miracle

"It must have been a miracle that he was not hurt," the truck driver, Caleb Malcolm, told The Gleaner.

Relating the incident, Mr. Malcolm said he saw bolts sticking out on the bridge and said to himself that "Those bolts are going to soak up somebody this morning." Shortly after he made that statement he heard something slam under the right side of the trailer and felt the vehicle being dragged along the road.

The impact caused the truck to overturn, but it was not until he got out to investigate the damage that he realised that the tonnes of marl he was carrying had plastered the street and the truck had found its way on top of the car.

"I have never felt more frightened," he said.

Alternative routes

As traffic came to a snarl on the highway and motorists were forced to fin routes, the town's citizens used the time to curse the NWA for its tardiness in responding to complaints made by the police and several motorists who have had their vehicles damaged on the defective roadway over the past two weeks.

"There have been numerous minor accidents since the bolts that hold the mid-section of the bridge started loosening up two weeks ago," said Sgt. Amos Thompson of the Montego Freeport Police Station.

"A senior structural engineer will be visiting the area with a view to effecting repairs," Stephen Shaw, NWA communications director, told The Gleaner after the incident.

janet.silvera@gleanerjm.com