the essential
On Monday, November 18, 2019, the Mirepoix-sur-Tarn bridge collapsed under the weight of a truck dragging a trailer. The driver of the road vehicle died, as did a 15-year-old girl. The trial for this tragedy opens this Tuesday before the Toulouse criminal court.
Find answers, try to understand and determine compensation. The trial which opens this Tuesday morning before the Toulouse criminal court will pursue these ambitions after the hearing is postponed to mid-September. Especially that of understanding the sequence which led to the tragedy in a few minutes on the morning of Monday November 18, 2019 in Mirepoix-sur-Tarn. The collapse of the bridge caused the deaths of two people.
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Collapse of the Mirepoix bridge: why the trial was postponed
On the morning of the accident in Bessières, in the north-east of Haute-Garonne, a heavy machine appeared at the entrance to this bridge in service since 1935 and which allowed crossing the Tarn river. At the wheel, Damien Calvel, manager of a local company specializing in drilling.
Truck and trailer weighed more than 58 tonnes
A regular in the area and the area. He must have crossed this bridge by car or truck dozens of times without incident. But that morning, his truck added to its trailer where a drill was located far exceeded 19 tons, the maximum load indicated at the entrance to the building.
Only Damien Calvel who was heading towards Mirepoix did not take this limit into account. And despite the honking of the horn and the flashing of the headlights from his employee, right behind him in a car, he committed himself. Opposite, in a Renault Clio, Marie-Carole and her daughter Lisa were driving towards the school bus stop.
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The more than 58 tonnes of the truck and its trailer caused the support cables and the deck to break. The truck plunged into the muddy waters of the Tarn, trapping Damien Calvel who was unable to escape. The Renault Clio also tipped towards the river. Despite significant injuries, the driver managed to reach the bank, not her daughter.
The company sued
The investigating judge, who relies on the technical conclusions of the expertise, considers that Damien Clavel, manager of the company Puits Julien Fondation, is solely responsible for the accident. This driver died in the bridge collapse. His company, in liquidation, still exists and will be prosecuted in court.
To try to provide answers to the relatives of the victims traumatized by the tragedy. To see, also, if the insurance of the company Puits Julien Fondation can be called into question. A penal issue full of meaning and not only for Marie-Carole, Lisa's mother whose father died of cancer four years after the tragedy.
