Himachal Landslide Nightmare For 200 Vacationers

Himachal Landslide Nightmare For 200 Vacationers [ad_1]

Himachal Pradesh landslide: Stranded vacationers mentioned the site visitors jam is at the very least 15 km lengthy

New Delhi:

A site visitors jam at the very least 15 km-long, no resort room accessible and no clue on how lengthy the wait will probably be -- 200-odd folks, most of them vacationers, reside a nightmare after they have been stranded attributable to a block on the nationwide freeway connecting Mandi and Kullu in Himachal Pradesh.

The freeway has remained blocked since final night following flash floods and landslides triggered by heavy rain within the hill state. In line with officers, explosives are getting used to blast heavy boulders blocking the highway. The highway will probably be open to site visitors motion solely after seven-eight hours, the officers mentioned, in keeping with a PTI report.

The commuters, in the meantime, are having a harrowing time.

NDTV spoke to Sohail Yousuf and Azaz Hasan, vacationers stranded because of the large highway blockade. The 2 vacationers from Delhi have been on their solution to Bhuntar airport once they received caught within the blockade. "A number of landslides befell between Mandi and Sundarnagar. At 10 pm, police stopped us and requested us to return. The site visitors jam right here is at the very least 15-km lengthy," Mr Hasan informed NDTV in a video interplay.

"No vacationer right here was ready for this. There are households, children. Some have booked entire buses. Some are ready at dhabas, nobody might discover a resort room. They're frightened for his or her kids," he added.

Mr Hasan mentioned these areas have energy initiatives and vacationer resorts, however there isn't any various highway connecting them. "A freeway is shut from 5 pm yesterday, however the highway hasn't been cleared even now," he mentioned.

Mr Yousuf mentioned they do not know when site visitors motion will resume. "We do not know if ought to drive forward or return. We acquired no prior data from police on this case," he mentioned.

Mr Hasan mentioned there ought to have been a system in place to tell folks earlier than they approached the blockade. "We left at midday yesterday and reached right here round 10 pm. So we drove for about 5 hours after the landslide and we had no clue that it had led to this highway blockade. And we're stopped right here. By then, there may be already a 6-km site visitors jam," he mentioned.

Adesh Katyayan, one other vacationer caught in Himachal's tough climate, was on his solution to Kullu when a landslide befell in entrance of them and blocked the highway. "We needed to head again to Mandi, we spent the night time there. Now we're once more on the way in which to Kullu," he mentioned. He mentioned at the very least 500 vehicles have been stranded on the route he took and lots of people spent the night time on the highway.

In a improvement that can fear vacationers and their households extra, the native climate workplace has issued alert for extra rain and thunderstorms in Himachal over the subsequent two days.

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