Traffic chaos made an unwelcome comeback on the Mumbai–Pune Expressway on Thursday morning after a cement-laden container vehicle developed a mechanical failure near Lonavala, bringing movement in the ghat section to a grinding halt.

Commuters travelling from Pune towards Mumbai were left stranded as vehicles piled up rapidly, forming long queues that stretched for several kilometres. Videos circulating on social media showed cars, buses and trucks completely stationary, with frustrated passengers stepping out onto the roadway while waiting for the blockage to clear.

The latest disruption came barely hours after authorities managed to restore traffic on the Mumbai-bound side of the expressway following a high-risk gas tanker accident in the same ghat stretch. The back-to-back incidents sparked fresh outrage among daily commuters and long-distance travellers.

Earlier, a tanker carrying highly inflammable propylene gas had overturned near the Adoshi tunnel in the Khandala ghat area, forcing officials to shut the Mumbai-bound carriageway for an extended period. The incident resulted in one of the worst traffic snarls in recent months, with vehicles stuck bumper-to-bumper for nearly 30 kilometres at the peak of congestion.

Thousands of passengers, including families with children, were stranded overnight without access to food, drinking water or basic facilities. Emergency teams from multiple agencies, including disaster response forces, petroleum experts, highway police and expressway authorities, worked through the night to safely transfer the gas and remove the damaged tanker.

Traffic movement was finally restored in the early hours of Thursday, offering brief relief—only for commuters to be hit again by the cement container breakdown soon after.