For more than 14 hours, motorists and commuters on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway endured a gruelling traffic nightmare after a multiple-vehicle crash at the Kara Bridge collided with ongoing repair works, bringing movement along the busy corridor to a near standstill.
The crash occurred in the early hours of Tuesday and involved seven vehicles, initially disrupting traffic heading towards Ogun State. But as the day progressed and the wreckage remained on the road, the resulting congestion stretched beyond the Long Bridge, through Magboro and deep into Lagos.
By 7am, motorists travelling from Lagos towards Ogun State were already caught in the gridlock. As the hours passed, frustration mounted, with some motorists resorting to driving against traffic in a desperate attempt to bypass the congestion — only to create another bottleneck for vehicles heading towards Lagos.
The Lagos State Emergency Management Agency, LASEMA, said its LRT Tiger Squad stationed at C3 was mobilised to the scene at 6:05am after receiving a distress call, arriving within the projected response time.
According to the agency’s Permanent Secretary, Dr Olufemi Damilola Oke-Osanyintolu, the vehicles involved were a 40-foot container truck without a registration number, a Toyota Hilux, an interstate bus, a Hyundai Odyssey, a Sienna, a Toyota Highlander and a Mitsubishi Hilux.
Preliminary findings, he said, indicate that the container truck developed a mechanical fault while in motion, causing its driver to lose control and crash into the six other vehicles.
LASEMA said it activated its incident management protocol and worked alongside the Lagos State Traffic Management Authority, LASTMA, and the Nigeria Police Force to secure the scene, prevent secondary crashes and ease the resulting traffic build-up.
LASTMA officials remained at the scene to monitor the situation and facilitate the restoration of normal traffic flow, while the recovered vehicles were handed over to the police for documentation and further necessary action.
But by the time the damaged vehicles were cleared, the disruption had already spread across a significant stretch of the expressway, leaving thousands of commuters stranded and turning what began as an early-morning crash into a day-long traffic ordeal.
