The British-era suspension bridge had undergone repairs for six months, and had reopened for public use just 4 days ago on October 26.
Morbi (Gujarat): A British-era suspension bridge across the Machhu river in Morbi town of Gujarat collapsed on Sunday, October 30 the cable bridge collapsed when there were over 400 to 500 visitors on the bridge, a report in The Tribune, Chandigarh, says.
As many as 135 bodies have been recovered, 180 persons were rescued and still many people are feared missing till Monday morning.
Nearly 200 jawans from the Army, Navy, NDRF, SDRF, local fire brigade teams, and local divers and swimmers have joined the search operation.
Former BJP MLA from Morbi Assembly constituency, Kantilal Amrutiya has told mediapersons on Monday morning that throughout Sunday evening, the search operation was underway as the death toll may go up.
Morbi town will voluntarily observe a bandh on Monday to mourn the deaths of people who died in the incident.
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The Rajkot district magistrate Arun Mahesh Babu is also camping at Morbi.
He told the media that the search operation is likely to continue for the next 24 hours.
Gujarat resident alerted security
A family from Ahmedabad had visited the suspension bridge on Sunday, October 30 and noticed that a few youth were shaking the suspension bridge. Fearing damage, they alerted the security guard on duty but his response was indifferent.
Vijay Goswami told mediapersons that he and his family visited the bridge around 3 p.m. At that time, nearly 150 to 200 visitors had ccome to see the newly reopened bridge the bridge. Since a few youth were shaking the bridge, elders and children were finding it difficult to either walk or stand .
When Vijay and his family climbed the bridge, they drew the attention of the security guard on duty and asked to stop the youth shaking the bridge or it will damage, but the security guard’s response was discouraging.
The Goswami family left the city around 4 p.m. and returned to Ahmedabad and later that evening they heard the bridge had collapsed.
Since its reopening on October 26, 10,000 visitors had visited the bridge.
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