Hyderabad: Minister Road section caves in

Hyderabad: A part of Minister Road, a lifeline for many commuters, caved in on Saturday morning, and traffic has thus been blocked on one side of the road.
An Airtech machine of the Metro Sewerage Board, that is used to clean clogged drains. got stuck in the pit.

The sunken part of the road is two metres in length and two metres in depth.
The area falls under Ambedkar nagar, downstream of Hussainsagar, where the Kalasiguda pipeline carries sewerage water from different colonies.

Mr Rameshwar Rao, director, operations and maintenance, HMWSSB, said, “The damaged pipeline is 600 mm in diameter. The repairs will take over four days. There are many cable lines beneath and the depth of the sewer is 14 feet.”
He said that what led to the collapse of the road was the breaking of the old pipeline laid over 30 years ago.

“As the pipeline collapsed, sewer water gushed onto the road. Many pumps were used to arrest the overflow, which was later pumped into the Kalasiguda nala.”
The sewage water seeped into the soil, softening it and the surface of the road caved in. This is also what happened in front of Kamat Hotel in Secunderabad in December 2016.

Around 1.5 lakh commuters use the road every day. It is the prime connector to Necklace Road. A large number of sewerage lines in the city have outlived their life of 30 years. The sewer network, especially in the core city, needs an immediate revamp.