Mumbai: Family of 6 escape major accident on their way to a water park

The WagonR they were travelling in tumbled twice on the road before colliding with the truck. Pics/Hanif Patel

A truck and sheer luck saved a family of seven from an otherwise disastrous highway accident. The incident occurred around 9 am on Wednesday near Virar on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad highway, when Thane resident Ramesh Sharma and his family of six were on their way to the Great Escape water park.

Ramesh Sharma and his family escaped with minor injuries

Lost control
The family, which includes Ramesh's mother Asha, mother-in-law Manda, wife Sonal, children Yash and Veer and nephew Alfa, were seated in a WagonR being driven by Ramesh. Suddenly, a truck driving ahead of Ramesh took a sharp cut to avoid hitting a stray dog crossing the highway. Ramesh did the same to save his car from colliding with the truck. But in the process, one of tyres in his car burst and the vehicle tumbled twice on the road, before hitting the stationary truck parked at the side. Looking at the state of Sharma's car, one could easily imagine the fate of its occupants. But in this case, they caught a lucky break. "The car was badly damaged. Luckily, all of my family members are safe and have suffered only minor injuries," Ramesh told mid-day.

Lucky escape
He added, "The vehicle would have fallen into the deep gorge had the truck not been parked there. It became our saviour. After the car collided with it and stopped, people rushed to help us and immediately removed us from the car. By the grace of god nobody was injured. The people and Waliv police supported us a lot."

So how did the rest of the day go? "The children were very scared. To remove the fear from their minds, we took them on a small trip and then went home."

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