“Kavach Wouldn’t Have Worked Because…”: Railways Explains Train Crash

New Delhi:

The Railway Board immediately detailed the occasions resulting in the catastrophic triple practice accident in Odisha’s Balasore on Friday evening that killed at least 288 people and left over 1,000 injured. Railways Minister Ahswini Vaishnaw has stated the accident was brought about attributable to a difficulty with the “digital interlocking system”.

The Bahanaga Bazar station in Balasore, where the horrific crash took place, is a four-line station, the railways defined, including that there are two foremost traces within the center and two loop traces on both facet. There have been items trains loaded with iron ore on each the loop traces.

The Shalimar-Chennai Central Coromandel Categorical was travelling from Chennai to Howrah and Bengaluru-Howrah Superfast Categorical was coming from Howrah. The sign was inexperienced on each the primary traces. Coromandel Categorical was going at 128 kmph and the opposite passenger practice was at a pace of 126 kmph. The restrict is 130 kmph, therefore none of them was overspeeding, Jaya Verma Sinha, Member, Operations & BD, Railway Board, stated.

A signalling downside was detected, she stated, including that particulars will solely emerge after additional investigation. Ms Sinha stated the response time was very much less at such a excessive pace. “There was a signalling interference,” she stated, including that it could not be appropriate to name it a failure. The Railway Board repeatedly echoed the Railways Minister’s assertion that these are simply preliminary findings, and nothing concrete may be stated till the formal enquiry is over.

Ms Sinha repeatedly pressured that just one practice, the Coromandel Categorical, and never three, as has been allegedly speculated, suffered an accident.

“For some motive, that practice met with an accident, and the engine and coach went over it,” she stated. It crashed right into a items practice filled with iron ore stationed on one of many loop traces, she defined, claiming that the products practice absorbed all of the shock of the crash because it was very heavy. Coaches of the Coromandel Categorical obtained thrown off into the third observe and rammed into a few coaches of the practice approaching at excessive pace from Howrah, Ms Sinha stated.

“There have been Linke Hofmann Busch (LHB) coaches, they’re very protected,” she stated, including that injury was worse as a result of iron ore.

The railways has stated that “Kavach”, the indigenously developed automated practice safety system, was not accessible on the route the place the accident occurred on Friday night.

Ms Sinha, dismissing West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s query on the absence of Kavach, reiterated the Railways Minister’s assertion that the crash had nothing to do with Kavach because it would not have been useful in averting such an accident. No expertise on the planet can avert some accidents, she stated, citing examples of boulders immediately dropping in entrance of autos for instance.

The system alerts when a loco pilot jumps a sign (Sign Handed at Hazard — SPAD), which is among the many main causes of practice collisions. The system can alert the loco pilot, take management of the brakes and produce the practice to a halt robotically when it notices one other practice on the identical line inside a prescribed distance.