Lucky escape
Lucky escape: Dr Corina Budileanu was lucky to walk away without serious injuries after colliding with a truck.
A LEONGATHA doctor cheated death after escaping a traffic collision caused by a pothole last Tuesday.
Dr Corina Budileanu’s vehicle was sideswiped by a milk tanker at high speed after she hit a pothole on the Bass Highway.
Police said her vehicle bounced out of the pothole and into the truck between Cross Road and Whitelaws Track.
Luckily, Dr Budileanu and the truck driver were uninjured, but her car was written off. The driver’s side door was almost ripped clean away and the front axle was bent severely.
The accident occurred as Deputy Premier and Gippsland South MLA Peter Ryan defended the government’s level of roads funding.
Dr Budileanu criticised the state of the region’s roads.
“The roads are just horrible,” she said.
“I am very lucky not to be hurt; these roads are a health risk and are putting lives in danger.”
Dr Budileanu travels the road regularly to and from work and said the potholes are horrible.
“I have damaged my wheel on potholes when coming in the other direction around a month ago,” she said.
“The roads are just too dangerous.”
The pothole in question has been drawn to the attention of VicRoads. It had already been classed as a ‘traffic hazard’.
VicRoads regional director Patricia Liew said: “This section of the Bass Highway has been earmarked for repair works and has had signs in place to warn motorists of the upcoming hazard.”
“VicRoads has today (Tuesday, January 17) carried out a temporary repair and has reduced the speed limit in the area to 60km/h, until permanent pavement strengthening works can be completed.”
VicRoads did not respond to a question about the risks posed by potholes.
South Gippsland Shire Councillor Bob Newton said roads are just not good enough.
“The roads really are disgusting,” he said.
“They need to be repaired completely and not just patched over; someone will get killed if they’re not fixed properly.”
Leongatha South resident Ross Johnson agreed.
“The whole road situation is pretty awful really. We’ve got VicRoads spending all this money on the barricades on the sides of the roads when they should be spending the money keeping the main part of the carriageway in a better state and a safer state for everyone using the roads,” he said.
Mr Johnson travels to and from work along the Bass Highway to Leongatha and said potholes are always getting bigger, with new ones appearing regularly.
“The one where the accident occurred has just been getting bigger and bigger over the past eight weeks,” he said.
“They need to be repaired before the damage goes so far that the whole road has to be ripped up and replaced.
“And the issue is not just on that road, it’s everywhere.”
After a recent driving trip to Adelaide, Mr Johnson said South Gippsland’s roads were by far the worst.
“The roads are much better even the other side of Melbourne, and in South Australia you’d struggle to find a pothole,” he said.
“I don’t know why they can’t get it right in our little corner of Victoria.”
Mr Ryan said the government had thrown more money than Labor at fixing roads.
“As a government, we are pouring as much resource as we can into this important area of investment,” he said.
“It is of course a two pronged issue of both the capital works to build better roads in the first place, coupled with the maintenance which is necessary to keep them at relevant standards.
“I do not underestimate, for one moment, the critical importance of the need while also asking you to recognise the enormity of the financial challenge.
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