Overturned truck halts Ranchi-Patna highway traffic for hours

Traffic movement on the busy Ranchi-Patna National Highway came to a halt for nearly four hours on Saturday after a truck overturned in the accident-prone Chutupalu Valley under the Ramgarh police station limits in Jharkhand, officials said.

According to Ramgarh Officer-in-Charge Naveen Prakash Pandey , the truck was travelling at high speed from Ranchi towards Ramgarh when the driver reportedly lost control of the vehicle while negotiating a stretch in the valley. The vehicle overturned on the highway, blocking traffic and leading to a long queue of stranded vehicles on both sides of the road.

Following the incident, police personnel, local administration officials and teams from the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) rushed to the spot and began efforts to clear the highway. Traffic remained severely affected during the operation, with hundreds of vehicles stranded for nearly 15 kilometres along the route.

After nearly four hours of intensive clearance work using cranes and other equipment, authorities managed to remove the overturned truck from the road and reopen two lanes of the highway for traffic movement , Pandey said.

The officer added that no casualties were reported in the incident , although the driver and co-driver sustained minor injuries . Both were given basic medical attention and were said to be out of danger.

Chutupalu Valley, a 12-kilometre stretch on the Ranchi-Ramgarh route , has long been considered an accident-prone zone with several identified black spots , despite repeated efforts by the NHAI and the local administration to improve safety.

A similar incident was reported recently in the same valley , where a truck accident had also disrupted traffic for several hours, highlighting persistent safety concerns along the stretch.