Infrastructure Minister Austin Gatt has instructed Transport Malta to seek “expert opinion” on the state of the infrastructure on a bridge where a truck, which almost fell five storeys, was held hanging in mid-air by a metal bar on Wednesday.
In a letter sent yesterday to Transport Malta chairman Mark Portelli and seen by The Times, the Transport Minister said the outcome of the accident on the Regional Road “cannot be described as anything more comforting than a lucky escape”.
Dr Gatt said it was imperative to exclude any possible issues with the road infrastructure or the maintenance processes for the location. However, he added, if any fault with the infrastructure was found the problem had to be eliminated to ensure such an accident was not repeated.
“I am... asking you to seek an independent and external expert opinion on the current state of the infrastructure of the location and the existing maintenance routines for the site to establish whether these are sufficiently adequate to avoid such an accident from occurring,” Dr Gatt said.
The minister also asked for recommendations to be made to rectify any problems and asked for a copy of the expert opinion to be forwarded to him.
There are no crash barriers along t he bridge where t he accident happened and the retaining wall is made up of concrete pillars joined together by two green metal bars and a concrete slab on top.
The side walls (parapet walls) on this part of the main artery contrast with the more modern retention structures found on the refurbished Regional Road bridge on the other side of the tunnel.
According to Transport Malta, the parapet wall was built as part of the flyover bridge in the 1970s. It did not say whether the parapet wall conformed to EU road safety standards.
A spokesman said the transport watchdog would carry out the necessary remedial works and erect “a concrete wall instead of the parapet wall and install a crash barrier”. The accident happened at about 8 a.m. on a wet road when the truck skidded, hit the side wall on the passenger side and spun across the road, breaking through the retaining wall on the opposite side.
It came to a standstill with its front two wheels dangling in mid-air as debris f rom the retaining wall crashed to the road below.
According to a Civil Protection Department officer, the truck did not tip over because one of the metal bars tore through the tyre on the driver’s side and lodged itself there.
The company director who owns the truck blamed the poor road surface, which exacerbated the slippery conditions.
The Transport Malta spokesman said that, although the cause of the accident had not yet been established, work would shortly be carried out to improve the road surface on the stretch of road where the accident occurred.
She said the upgrading works would be similar to the ones undertaken in the south-bound part of the road near the fuel station where imported aggregate was used to improve skid resistance.
ksansone@timesofmalta.com