Police couldn't believe truck driver was alive after blast that destroyed bridge
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Version 0 of 1. A truck driver who survived a blast that destroyed a bridge and part of a Queensland highway complained of a bad headache when help arrived. Police could not believe the driver was alive after his B-double truck, carrying more than 50 tonnes of ammonium nitrate, exploded on the Mitchell Highway south of Charleville on Friday night. The blast was so powerful it destroyed a bridge, hurling one 250kg chunk of reinforced concrete into the air. It landed 350 metres away. A vertical column of flame shot hundreds of metres into the air. And police who were more than a kilometre from the blast site were hit with sonic waves that felt like kicks to the chest. Constable Kenric Head was one of those who felt the body blows from so far away. When he reached the scene he said it did not seem possible that the man, lying under a tattered blanket on the roadway, could be anything but dead. But then he moved. “He blinked,” Head told the Courier-Mail. “We tried to talk to him about the footy but he didn’t follow the footy. But he did sort of joke with us, saying, ‘I have got a fucking headache.’ ” The 29-year-old constable has described how Friday night’s emergency played out. It began with reports from another Charleville police officer about a truck carrying highly flammable ammonium nitrate driving off a bridge into a creek about 30km outside the town. Then it blew. Eight people, including four firefighters and a police officer, were injured. Head has told the Courier-Mail of driving towards the scene as the other officer dodged huge chunks of concrete hurled into the air by the blast. Despite the risks to their safety, and concern that not all of the ammonium nitrate had been consumed in the initial blast, the police began searching the scene and found the truck driver. He is in a Brisbane hospital being treated for extensive burns. Investigations are continuing into the blast, which has sparked debate about how the transportation of dangerous cargoes are regulated. |