A cement truck's brakes failed and killed four in Akurana — are heavy vehicles checked enough?

On October 19, a cement mixer lost its brakes near Kurugoda Junction in Akurana and plowed into three-wheelers, motorcycles and other vehicles, killing four people including a teenage girl. The driver told police the brakes failed; the crash is still under investigation, but it's reignited an old argument — are lorries, tippers and mixers pulled in for brake and tyre checks as often as private cars, or do they mostly slip by until something goes wrong on the road? One side says commercial operators cut corners on maintenance because downtime costs money, and that a loaded mixer or tipper is a different beast on a hill road than a car — braking distance, blind spots, the lot. The other side says blaming "heavy vehicles" as a category is unfair when most crashes trace back to one driver's bad call or one owner's neglect, not every truck on the road. If you ride a three-wheeler or bike on roads shared with lorries and mixers, how do you actually protect yourself — distance, routes, timing? Tell us what you've seen go wrong out there. ඔබේ පළපුරුද්ද කියන්න - බර වාහන අතරින් යද්දී ඔබ මොනවද බලාගන්නේ?