Kamal Ghorui
KULLU: A 10-hour traffic crawl for 15km. Sub-zero cold. Tourists ditch cars, walk on ice.Thousands of tourists remained stranded in Manali for a second straight day Sunday as icy roads and an unprecedented traffic surge brought the popular hill town in Himachal Pradesh’s Kullu district to a standstill.Exit routes out of Manali were the worst hit. Slippery stretches and tailgating vehicles produced jams stretching more than 10km, all the way to the 15 Mile point near Patlikuhal, a small market town lower down the valley where snow had begun melting.A viral video allegedly shot around 2.30 am Sunday showed tourists hauling trolley bags across ice, some slipping and falling. “This is the situation of people who rushed to Manali, ended up stranded,” wrote an X user, @rose_k01. For hundreds, the ordeal stretched through the night. Buses, taxis and cars barely moved as mercury plunged below freezing. Many, including children, spent Saturday night shivering inside vehicles. “It took us 12 hours just to reach Patlikuhal,” said Kulwinder Singh from Ferozepur, Punjab. “We spent the night shivering in the car. I have never seen such a nightmarish traffic jam.”
Gridlock forces many tourists trek downhill from Manali
This is the situation of people who rushed to Manali, ended up stranded,” wrote an X user, @rose_k01. For hundreds, the ordeal stretched through the night. Buses, taxis and cars barely moved as mercury plunged below freezing. Many, including children, spent Saturday night shivering inside vehicles. “It took us 12 hours just to reach Patlikuhal,” said Kulwinder Singh from Ferozepur, Punjab. “We spent the night shivering in the car. I have never seen such a nightmarish traffic jam.”
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The distance from Manali to Patlikuhal is roughly 15km. For many, it took more than 10 hours.Despite snow-clearing efforts by NHAI, icy patches and sheer traffic volume rendered the two-lane Kullu-Manali highway nearly impassable. Weather stayed largely clear through Saturday and Sunday, but the road did not.Frustration boiled over. Desperate to escape, several tourists abandoned vehicles and trekked downhill on foot toward Patlikuhal. “This is easily the worst jam I’ve ever seen,” said Himanshu Sharma, a tourist from Noida. “I can reach Patlikuhal faster on foot than by car.”As thousands tried to get out, thousands more attempted to get in — chasing snowfall in Manali. Police blocked fresh inflow at Patlikuhal and Bhuntar, the valley town near Kullu airport. “We are only allowing 4×4 vehicles beyond Patlikuhal to prioritise evacuation of stranded tourists,” said Manali DSP K D Sharma. Kullu SP Madan Lal called the rush unprecedented. About 200 police personnel have been deployed round the clock, but the narrow mountain highway remains overwhelmed.More trouble may be coming. The Met office in Shimla has forecast another spell of heavy rain and snow from the night of Jan 26 through Jan 28. A severe cold wave continues across the Himalayan state. Tabo village in the remote Lahaul-Spiti district recorded the state’s lowest temperature Sunday at -10 degrees Celsius. Manali dropped to -1.1 degrees C.
