Employees of Tap Turbo Engineers Pvt Ltd, the firm that maintains the Coastal Road tunnel, described to mid-day the scenes of chaos that unfolded after a car erupted in flames on the southbound lane of the structure around noon on Wednesday.

Ravi Gupta, field in-charge of the tunnel, whose face was blackened with smoke, said hundreds of vehicles were abandoned in minutes after motorists saw the car in flames. “Even though the fire brigade took just about seven minutes to reach the spot despite the presence of abandoned cars, my team and I tried to bring the situation under control with fire extinguishers.”