Chaos for public after rail fracture

Mainline and transharbour railway line services were disrupted in the peak hours of the morning owing to a broken railway track at Vadala Road-Sewri on Thursday (Photo: Rajesh Jadhav)

Thursday morning was chaotic for office-goers, what with 22 trains cancelled on mainline and trans harbour and another 75 delayed following a rail fracture between Vadala Road and Sewri that brought services to a grinding halt for over 40 minutes.

Between the fracture being detected at 8.54am and being fixed by 9.40am, 16 services were cancelled on mainline harbour and six on trans-harbour resulting in delays along the Panvel-CST, Thane-Vashi, and Bandra-CST route.

Trains were delayed by 30 to 40 minutes and commuters questioned how this could happen after the railways took blocks twice between Vadala and CST in the past one-and-a-half month.

Prakash Subramanian (26), a sports consultant who resides in Nerul and travels to Parel every day, said that after two blocks which inconvenienced commuters, a fracture should not have occurred.

“They have taken two blocks exactly between Vadala Road and CST on two Saturdays/Sundays. What have they been doing during the blocks ” Mr Subramanian questioned.

“From what I have read, it is work related to converting our trains to 12 coaches but is that all that they did Didn’t they check the tracks and carry out some maintenance work during this time ” he said.

Fact is both blocks burst as the railways were not able to start services within the stipulated time.

The first block was taken on January 24 while the second was taken on October 25, both between 10.30 am and 5.00 pm but services were resumed as late as 6.30pm, leaving commuters who had stepped out on Sunday evening in a lurch.