The police commercial vehicle safety team is investigating and truck drivers have been urged to check the height of loads after a digger on a truck damaged an overbridge on Dunedin’s Southern Motorway.
Senior Sergeant Anthony Bond, of Dunedin, said a 68-year-old man had been driving a truck carrying a digger on the motorway (State Highway 1) on Friday about 1pm.
The digger failed to clear the Green Island overbridge and came off the truck, causing extensive damage to the truck chassis and digger.
Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency senior Otago network manager Chris Harris said the overbridge was assessed by engineers on Friday afternoon and was confirmed to be structurally sound.
No further work was required.
Another overhead strike happened on Friday at the Balclutha Bridge, which was inspected later that day and over the weekend by engineers.
Repairs on the bridge were already scheduled to take place in the current financial year so the new impact-damage repairs would be carried out as part of the same operation, Mr Harris said.
The bridge had been deemed structurally sound.
