From steep mountain-passes to routes that claim more lives than terrorist attacks, here
are 8 of the world’s most dangerous roads.
Number 8 Trollstigen Trollstigen, which in English translates as
Troll’s Path, is a serpentine mountain road in Norway that offers some of the most breathtaking
views in the world.
According to Norwegian folk tales, trolls roam the mountains alongside the road during
the nighttime only to change into stone when the sunlight hits them in the morning.
At the height of the tourist season, around 2,500 vehicles pass Trollstigen every day.
As they move up the single-lane road, deep fjords and lush valleys unfold below.
Trollstigen has an incline of 10% and 11 vertigo-inducing hairpin turns that snake up the steep mountainside.
The road reaches around 2,800 feet above sea level at its highest point.
It’s undoubtedly an engineering marvel but one that’s incredibly challenging to navigate.
The weather is unpredictable, the road is very narrow at certain points and rock falls
may occur.
The route is at its most dangerous in the dark and wet.
Vehicles that are over 40 feet long aren’t allowed on it and the road is closed during
autumn and winter.
Number 7 Guoliang Tunnel Road When the Chinese government decided that building
a tunnel to only be used by a couple hundred villagers wasn’t worth the cost, the people
of Guoliang village took matters into their own hands.
Over the course of five years, a group of thirteen villagers mainly used hammers and
chisels to carve a 0.75-mile-long tunnel into the side of the mountain.
The process was long and arduous.
It even claimed the life of one of the builders.
Aside from giving the village road access to the outside world, the Guoliang tunnel
ultimately became an international attraction.
Nowadays, 30 windows of different shapes and sizes allow light into the tunnel and they
were once used by builders to remove rubble from the site.
Even though it was built by people with no engineering experience, the tunnel’s structure
hasn’t claimed any lives.
However, the Guoliang tunnel passage is known as ‘the road that doesn’t tolerate mistakes’.
With a height of 15 feet and a width of 12 feet, it realistically only allows for one-way
traffic.
Since the narrow road was carved into the mountain in a rudimentary fashion, its outer
limits consist of irregular solid rock walls.
The slightest oversight can send drivers to the hospital or worse.
Number 6 Lena River Ice Road Navigating a road in the frozen Siberian wasteland
is no easy feat.
The Lena River ice road connects the urban settlement of Nizhny Bestyakh, on the river’s
east bank, to the port city of Yakutsk on the west side of the river.
It’s open from late December to the middle of April and it represents a vital route for
bringing supplies from Yakustk to remote settlements in the area.
Winter roads like these are the lifeblood of outlying Siberian communities, but driving
on them can be extremely dangerous.
Each year, dozens perish when their vehicles fall through cracking or melting ice.
Number 5 Zoji La On the Zoji La the roads are narrow, the drops
are steep and there’s no rail to protect drivers from plummeting several thousand feet.
This western Himalayan passage is basically a one-lane dirt road hugging some of the world’s
tallest mountains.
Located at an elevation of around 11,500 feet, the Zoji La connects the towns of Srinagar
and Leh in the Indian Kashmir.
Even though it’s only roughly 5.5 miles in length, driving through it requires experience,
a reliable vehicle and nerves of steel.
The Zoji La claimed lives as recently as June, 2018.
4 people were killed and another seriously injured after a vehicle skidded off the road
and fell into a gorge.
Number 4 North Yungas Road This 43 mile long gravel dirt track connects
the town of Coroico to the Bolivian capital city of La Paz, the highest administrative
capital in the world.
Nicknamed the Bath Road, the North Yungas Road used to be one of the most dangerous
routes on Earth.
Since the construction of a new highway nearby, most of the traffic is directed from the Bath
Road.
However, in its heyday, the road would claim anywhere from 200 to 300 lives each year.
Cars, trucks, buses, motorbikes and bicycles all fell victim to it.
Since the 1990s, thousands of thrill-seeking tourists take on the bath Road each year to
test their cycling prowess.
Even though measures have been put in place to make the road safer, for some daredevils
it’s a deadly decision.
The road starts from an elevation of 11,975 feet above sea level in La Paz, climbs to
15,260 feet at the La Cumbre pass before zig zagging its way to the town of Coroico, at
3,900 feet.
Most of the road is no wider than 10 feet and has no guardrails to protect from falls
of thousands of feet.
Rain can make the road muddy and slippery, fog can render drivers almost completely blind
and, depending on the season, there’s a constant threat of landslides or rock falls.
One of the worst road accidents in Bolivian history took place on the bath Road in July
1983, when a bus veered off it into a canyon, killing more than 100 passengers.
Number 3 Fairy Meadows Road Located in Pakistan’s Gilgit-Baltistan region,
the Fairy Meadows road is as beautiful as it is deadly.
Starting on the Karakoram Highway, the world’s highest paved international road, which connects
China and Pakistan, the Karakoram has a total length of around 800 miles and traces a route
of the ancient Silk Road.
The lives of 892 workers were lost, mostly in landslides and rock falls, while building
this highway.
It’s one of the world’s highest alpine climbs and Fairy Meadows is arguably the deadliest
portion to splinter from it.
The road’s 10-mile length is completely unmaintained and mainly consists of gravel.
Built hundreds of years ago, by villagers from the Nanga Parbat Mountain, it’s had
no repairs since.
It’s narrow, unstable and drivers, not cautious risk steep drops to certain bath.
The road is only accessible in the summer but may be closed at any time due to heavy
snowfall.
The most dangerous part of it is a tight 6-mile ascent on an uneven, unpaved road that doesn’t
feature any safety rails.
The final stretch of the road, leading all the way to Fairy Meadows, gets so narrow that
it can only be crossed on foot or bike.
Fairy Meadows is the starting point for people wanting to climb the Nanga Parbat, the 9th
highest mountain in the world.
Ironically, getting to the mountain safe and sound is arguably the most dangerous part
of the trip.
Number 2 Babyburt Of Yolu-D915 Located in Turkey’s Trabzon province, the
D915 is currently one of the most dangerous roads on the planet.
It measures around 65 miles and connects the town to Babyburt, a city in northeast Turkey.
The D915 doesn’t have any safety rails to protect from steep vertical drops of several
hundred feet and, because of the altitude, the weather is unpredictable.
Even though it starts and ends with asphalt, the bulk of the road consists of loose gravel.
As the D915 snakes its way down the mountain, revealing its 29 steep hairpins, drivers have
to face twists, and turns so narrow that it’s almost impossible to turn the first time.
Avalanches, landslides and heavy snowfalls can occur at any time.
Frequent patches of ice can make drivers lose control of their vehicles while unpredictable
blizzards limit visibility.
Derebasi Tesisleri, the road’s most dangerous portion, is often covered by snow and fog.
It can push even experienced drivers to the limit of their abilities.
Users from the website dangerousroads.org have voted this as the world’s most dangerous
road.
Number 1 Mumbai Railways Even though it’s not actually a road, India’s
railway system has to take the number one spot on our list as it claims more lives each
year than all of the previous entries combined.
Mumbai, the country’s most populous city, is particularly affected by train-related
accidents.
According to Mumbai Railway Police data, these incidents have claimed the lives of over 38,000
people since 2007.
That’s around 3,000 baths each year.
According to some analysts, India’s railways claim more lives in the country than terrorist
attacks.
Every day in Mumbai, around 7.5 million people pack into commuter trains and it’s always
a gruelling experience.
One commuter stated ‘Every day, we face bath while travelling’ while another said
‘Fear is always there’ in their daily routine.
Some walkways feature makeshift memorials with posters of the victims’ photos above
tables covered with flowers and melted candles.
When it comes to the railways in Mumbai, bath comes in many ways.
Most of the accidents involve people falling out of moving trains or crossing railways.
As people try to cling to jam-packed open doorways, they sometimes slip or they’re
accidentally pushed.
Some grab the edges of open doors or a single pole in the doorway.
As they quite literally hang on for their lives outside the train, they’re sometimes
killed when they hit against poles and signal posts alongside the tracks.
Many are killed by the wide gap between the train’s doors and the railway.
People have also died after being electrocuted by overhead wires, which carry around 25,000
volts.
Since there aren’t enough pedestrian overpasses and those that do exist tend to be overcrowded,
crossing the railways is a common practice that often turns deadly.
These issues have been going on in Mumbai and the rest of India for years.
Indians have become increasingly more critical of their officials condemning the tendency
to allocate funds on trivial matters instead of focusing on the crumbling railway network,
which continues to claim thousands of lives each year.