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Mülheim (North Rhine-Westphalia) – 35,000 diesel and gasoline are burned here, and the annoying consequences for travelers continue!
A tanker truck burned under a railway bridge on the A40 in Mülheim on Thursday. The fire could only be extinguished after more than an hour. The flames were sometimes 15 to 20 meters high, a fire department spokesman said.
A huge cloud of smoke billowed over the crash site.
Photo: Roland Weihrauch / dpa
According to the police, the railway bridge was so damaged “that it will have to be completely removed in the next few days.” The road, which has been damaged over several hundred meters, also needs to be renovated.
Autobahn 40 between the Kaiserberg and Mülheim-Dümpten junction is closed for cleaning and construction work. “We must first check the stability of the bridge before we can start work,” a Straßen.NRW spokeswoman said on Friday morning. A bridge specialist from the state company and a railway employee were already on site that night. Investigations of the bridge are not yet complete.
The truck burned under a road bridge.
Photo: Roland Weihrauch / dpa
According to police, the drunk driver (41) of the van had drifted out of the right lane, collided with a barrier, and then hit the concrete barrier on the left, where the truck stopped. The Nissan of a 60-year-old man driving behind was pushed to the left limit by the truck.
Both drivers could have been saved, the fire department spokesman said. They were taken to the hospital seriously injured. There was no danger of death. The Nissan did not burn, but it was very dirty with soot.
Rail traffic was initially unaffected, as a rail spokeswoman said. The section of the route will not be used until Sunday including for works.
The accident caused considerable obstacles to traffic in the western Ruhr area. There are still miles of traffic jams on many of the surrounding highways.
