Chennai – A stretch of road in Chennai’s Anna Salai caved in yesterday, trapping a city bus and a car. Passengers however managed to escape and there were no injuries, authorities said.

Tamil Nadu Finance Minister D. Jayakumar blamed the construction of an underground metro line for the incident.

The incident took place around 2.30 pm, on a stretch where underground metro construction is going on. Giant cranes arrived in ninety minutes on spot to retrieve the trapped vehicles.

Traffic along the area was diverted.“It appears to be due to the impact of the metro rail work. It’s a lesson for us. The stretch will be fixed and traffic restored by Monday evening,” Jayakumar said.

Metro construction authorities said the soil appeared to have loosened due to underground drilling.  Both the car and the bus were removed with tow trucks brought in by the Fire Dept.