THE body of a 22-year-old market vendor was fished out of the Demerara River after the canter truck she was travelling in yesterday on the Demerara Harbour Bridge toppled overboard from the retractor span.Dead is Gangadai Persaud of Tuschen, New Scheme, East Bank Essequibo, who has a nine-month-old baby. Her reputed husband, Dhanram Ramdeo Ramall, called ‘Rico,’ was the driver of the canter truck with licence plate GEE 4540.

The 26-year-old Ramlall swam to safety as Persaud who was pinned in the passenger seat succumbed after the vehicle sunk in the Demerara River. The driver was taken into police custody at the Providence Police Station.
According to an eyewitness, the driver of the canter was trying to pick up a bag of boulanger (egg plant) that dropped off the canter while he was heading east on the Harbour Bridge. The driver, in order to retrieve the bag decided to reverse on the ramp and his wheel jumped over the ridge of the retractor span on the bridge, causing the entire vehicle to topple overboard.
“The man look like he was trying to turn back, and is reverse he was reversing before the wheel jump over the edge, then the whole vehicle gone overboard,” the eyewitness explained.
Reports reveal that the accident occurred between 04:00 -04:30 hrs Sunday morning when the cash- crop vendors were heading to Plaisance Market on the East Coast of Demerara.
Bridge staff assisted
Several Harbour Bridge staff also assisted, using a hydraulic crane to aid with the retrieval of the canter truck. The woman was pulled out of the vehicle through the front windscreen and was taken by speedboat to another section of the bridge where she was placed in a hearse that took the body to the Lyken Funeral Parlour.
Relatives of the dead woman rushed onto the Harbour Bridge after word spread of the accident. The dead woman’s mother, Anjali Persaud, said that after receiving a call she rushed to the scene and saw her son-in-law on a pontoon.
“Meh ask am where meh daughter deh, he say mommy I try to get her out but meh na get to get she out, all he was doing was sitting down and crying on the pontoon, both of them can swim I don’t know what really happen,” the mother lamented.
Reports revealed that the driver of the canter gave police various stories pertaining to what caused the accident. One being that his steering mechanism had cut, causing him to lose control of the vehicle and another saying that he fell asleep behind the wheel, causing the vehicle to topple overboard. However, eyewitnesses have dismissed such events.
Meanwhile, General Manager of the Demerara Harbour Bridge Corporation Rawlston Adams said at 04:30hrs Sunday morning a supervisor received a call that a canter truck had gone off the bridge at span 11.
Conflicting reports

“The canter driver had said that the rain was falling and he fell asleep and the truck went over the bridge… we were getting conflicting reports, one eyewitness reported that the truck was seen trying to turn around on the bridge and reverse off the bridge,” he explained.
Underscoring that a diver confirmed that the truck went off the bridge tail first, Adams said the tide caused a delay with retrieving the vehicle since the current needed to change before the vehicle was extracted.
Noting that many vehicles have ended up overboard at span 11 of the Harbour Bridge, the general manager said many redesigns were suggested for the retraction section, but none to date would enable the bridge to properly operate.
“Anything that we put up there will be in the way of the proper operation of the bridge, with these trucks and cars one has to understand they will still break through the barrier, since the mechanism put there has to be strong enough to restrict a vehicle from going over, that is a challenging task for that spot.”
Adding that the average speed for that section of the bridge should not be more than 5 km per hour, he said with that speed no vehicle should lose control; as such, if a vehicle topples over, the driver was doing something that should not be done.
He confirmed that there are no cameras at that section of the Harbour Bridge.