A broken down crane in the right lane of Mandela Highway, which was the cause of a massive traffic pile-up Thursday evening and again Friday, was finally removed to the soft shoulder.

Some motorists complained of being stuck in traffic for two hours, just moving from Three Miles to the Highway 2000 entrance on Mandela Highway.

The traffic police said Friday that the heavy duty unit is owned by civil engineering entity, China Harbour Engineering Company Ltd.

Head of the Public Safety and Traffic Enforcement Branch, Assistant Commissioner of Police Gary McKenzie told the Jamaica Observer that the crane was still in the right lane of the highway up to early Friday afternoon, severely impeding traffic, but was eventually removed from the right lane to the soft shoulder.

McKenzie said that while the flow on the toll road heading to Portmore was normal, delays on the Mandela Highway as a result of the obstruction caused by the disabled crane impacted the movement of traffic around the Corporate Area.

“You normally have two lanes of traffic going down to Caymanas and it is turned into one — that was a major situation that caused the [pile-up],” he said.