Billboard crash kills 2, hurts 8

Two people were killed and eight others injured when a poorly-mounted hoarding collapsed on them in front of a market at Gulshan-1 during the storm that swept through the capital yesterday evening.
The collasped hoarding also wrecked four cars and a motorbike.
Of the deceased, one was identified as Saiful Islam Sobhan, 15, an employee of Arjun Fast Food at Gulshan Shopping Centre in Gulshan-1 while the other was an unidentified driver of one of the wrecked cars.
“All on a sudden a billboard with its base pillars fell on our car while we were passing Gulshan-1 intersection. After one and a half hours’ hectic efforts, fire brigade officials rescued me from the smashed car,” Abdul Mannan, driver of a private car told The Daily Star.
The street in front of the market was closed off to traffic and the authorities concerned were trying to remove the hoarding as of filing of this report at 10:30pm.
Fire brigade sources said Saiful was standing in front of the market during the storm. The hoarding fell on him and the vehicles around 6:50pm from the top of the six-storey market.
Sources said the injured were all in the parked cars. They were rushed to local clinics.
The driver died at United Hospital in Gulshan, said Dhaka Metropolitan Police Commissioner AKM Hafiz Akhter.
The body of Saiful was rushed to Dhaka Medical College Hospital where the doctors declared him dead at 8:45pm.
Meanwhile, four people were injured in two different incidents at the capital’s Jurain and Donia during the storm.
Jahanara Begum, 55, her son Sagor, 10, and her 20-days-old grandson Imon sustained injuries when a portion of a wall of a three-storey under-construction building collapsed on a tin-shed house at Donia.
In another incident in Jurain, roof of a tin-shed house was blown away during the storm leaving Shahnaz begum wounded. All the four injured were admitted to DMCH.
The Met office in Dhaka recorded the wind speed of yesterday’s northwester at 26-56km per hour. It also recorded 22 millimetres of rain.
Sylhet, Jessore and Madaripur had 11mm of rainfall while Khulna 3mm and Chandpur 2mm. Another northwester swept through Barisal.
The Dhaka City Corporation had then taken an initiative to remove all the illegal hoardings especially, those on top of buildings and dangerous for city dwellers.
A committee was also formed to ascertain the number and locations of the risky hoardings.
Earlier on May 6, 2007, a man died and three others sustained injuries when a hoarding collapsed on a payphone shop near Hazrat Shahjalal (RA) International Airport during a storm.
The same year, a security guard of a CNG filling station at Pragati Sarani was killed when a hoarding collapsed on the station during a storm. It also damaged a number of cars parked at the station.

Courtesy of The Daily Star