A decades-old bridge has collapsed onto Russia’s famous Trans-Siberian Railway, injuring a truck driver and halting traffic in a key local transport hub.
Social media footage showed sections of the bridge, built in 1982, falling underneath a crossing truck in the Far East town of Svobodny, 7,500 kilometers east of Moscow. Another video featured a rail worker making a last-second escape from beneath the rubble.
The Far East Amur region governor’s office announced a state of emergency and said the truck driver had been hospitalized with a broken shin and a heel bone fracture.
“This overpass was practically the only working route to the part of the city on the other side of the railway,” the governor’s office said Monday.
Around 10,000 people on the other side of the bridge are at risk of being cut off from from the rest of the city, it added.
Local media collected photos and videos from local residents saying the collapse of the well-worn bridge had brought traffic to a standstill.
“The bridge fell and life in Svobodny came to a halt,” one resident was quoted as saying, while another said the bridge was “under major strain from heavy vehicles.”
Investigators are conducting a preliminary inquiry into the incident.
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