A herd of elephants on Sunday took position on National Highway-5 between Cuttack and Angul disrupting vehicular communications for hours.
Sources said the jumbo herd strayed from the nearby jungles and stayed put on the road at Boli Bauli Chhak.
This led to hundreds of vehicles stranded on both sides of the highway.
Some locals alleged that this is not happening for the first time.
Recently, this has become routine due to rampant felling of trees in the nearby jungles by the timber mafia.
The animals have lost their natural habitat.
With the temperatures soaring they are not finding any cool place to take rest.
So, they are straying to the NH to find shade under the big trees lining both sides of it.
Meanwhile, forest officials rushed to the spot and were trying to drive away the animals to the jungle till filing of the report.