Mumbai : The delay in the restoration process of the derailed coaches between Vile Parle and Andheri railway station on the Western line resulted into cancellation of over 100 services on Wednesday, causing inconvenience to thousands of commuters.
As most of the cancellations were during the morning peak hours, following blockage of both the fast corridors, the stations bustling with people eagerly waiting to reach their destinations. However, it wasn’t an easy day for railway officials either, who were engaged in the restoration work for about 24 hours.
The fifth coach from the EMU, which has a broken axial, had got stuck on a twisted rail due to which the workers spent hours trying to figure out a way to salvage the coach. They earlier tried to lift the coach using hydraulic jacks and then replacing the broken rails and sleepers on which they could move it. However, this didn’t work out. At last, they brought a 140-tonne crane from Kurla to lift the coach from the rails.
As the crane was quite huge, the down fast line too had to be blocked in the morning, which again resulted into delay in services. This affected the morning peak hour traffic. The over head wires were remove to ensure easy movement on crane’s arm. The coach was finally lifted off the tracks by 8:30 am and subsequently restoration of the tracks was started. The broken rails and sleepers were replaced swiftly for allowing the trains to pass.
Railway officials were mulling over scrapping the coach which has been extensively due to the lifting of the coach but later decide to do extensive repair. Divisional Railway Manager of Mumbai Division of WR, Shailendra Kumar, who supervised the restoration operations, said, “We got a break down crane from Central Railway for the purpose, and have detached the derailed coach whose axle was broken, and it has been placed on the east side of the track.”
A caution of 20 kmph has been issued in that stretch as cross over point is yet to be repaired. Another section had been issued a caution order of 30 kmph which further hampered the train operation on Wednesday. Chief PRO of WR, Sharat Chandrayan said, “There will be a special block taken during the night and the point will be fixed.”
