Traffic movement on the 270-km Jammu-Srinagar national highway was restored on Saturday after remaining suspended for 12 hours as rolling stones from a hillock in Ramban district damaged a steel tunnel, officials said.
The traffic from both sides of the strategic highway, the only all-weather road linking Kashmir with the rest of the country, was restored around 2 pm, the officials said.
Over 1,000 stranded trucks and some passenger vehicles are being cleared, they said.
The officials said shooting stones from the hillock overlooking the highway extensively damaged the steel tunnel near Panthiyal in the early hours of Saturday, forcing suspension of the traffic.
The restoration work was hampered by the falling rocks at regular intervals, they said, adding the agencies concerned removed the damaged girders and finally the traffic was allowed from both sides.
The engineers are assessing the damage to the tunnel and the repair work will be started shortly, according to the officials.–(PTI)
