WATCH: Locals panic after cable car gets stuck at 90-ft height in Bhedaghat; 'Mock drill', discloses NDRF

Jabalpur (Madhya Pradesh): A few cable cars loaded with passengers suddenly got stuck at a height of 90-feet in Jabalpur’s Bhedaghat on Monday, giving goosebumps to both the people on board and the onlookers. However, it was later revealed that the incident was part of a mock drill done to test the preparedness of ropeway sites in emergency situations.

Keeping in mind the Trikut rope-way accident at Deoghar in Jharkhand last year, teams of NDRF Varanasi conducted a joint mock exercise with the local administration at the rope-way sites of Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh under the Disaster Preparedness and Mitigation Plan. 

In this series, under the supervision of Deputy Commandant Santosh Kumar, a mock exercise on cable car emergency was organised jointly with the District Disaster Management Authority, various stakeholders and employees associated with ropeway operations at Bhedaghat. During the mock exercise, a scenario was depicted on cable car emergency, in which due to some technical problem on the ropeway at Narmada Bhedaghat, the cable cars got stuck at a height of about 90 feet and passengers were trapped inside.

IRS guidelines emphasised throughout mock drill

The incident was immediately reported to emergency control. From there, the information was forwarded to the NDRF control room and all concerned stakeholders for emergency response. On reaching the spot, the NDRF team made a preliminary assessment as well as set up a base of operations, command post, medical post and communication post.

After assessment the team immediately started the rescue operation and all the trapped victims were provided with various rope rescue and other equipment for their safe evacuation. All the victims were rushed to the hospital after being given first aid by the medical agencies. The guidelines of the Incident Response System (IRS) were emphasised and followed throughout the exercise.