PIONEER EDGE NEWS SERVICE/Dehradun
Five people died in three separate road accidents in Uttarakhand over the weekend. All three operations involved State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) teams, who conducted night and hill-terrain rescues.
The first accident occurred near Kainchi Dham in Nainital district late on Saturday in which three Almora residents died. An SDRF team from Khairna reached the spot after receiving information about a Mahindra XUV500 that fell nearly 60 metres into a gorge near Kainchi Dham. The vehicle was travelling from Almora to Haldwani and had four people onboard. The team rescued one injured person and sent him to the hospital. They recovered the bodies of the three others and handed them over to the local police. The deceased were identified as Sanjay Bisht, Surendra Bhandari and Pushkar Bhaisora, all residents of Almora. The injured person was identified as Manoj Kumar from Almora. In a separate incident in Tehri district, a car fell about 60 metres into a gorge near Badiyar village in the Ghansali area late Saturday. The only occupant of the vehicle died on the spot. SDRF personnel retrieved the body and transferred it to police for further procedures. The deceased was identified as 55-year-old Belap Singh Gusain from Tehri. In the third incident, one person died after a dumper truck went off the road and plunged nearly 100 metres into a gorge on Arms Road in Kotdwar, Pauri district on Sunday. The SDRF teams reached the site, climbed down to the damaged vehicle and recovered the body using a rope stretcher. Police identified the deceased as 36-year-old Dhirendra Rawat. The officials informed that the police and SDRF have completed the required procedures in all three cases. Authorities are examining the causes of the accidents and the investigation is ongoing, they added.
