LUCKNOW: A preliminary probe into the Thursday's derailment of Chandigarh-Dibrugarh Express (15904) conducted by a six-member team of railway officials has found cloth pieces were used with at least 72 elastic rail clips to fasten the
rail track
. The team blamed the engineering department for the derailment. One member of the panel, however, disagreed with the opinion, while a railway spokesperson said the findings were premature.
Elastic rail clips (ERC) which are better known as pandrol clips are used to fasten the rail with concrete sleepers in order to bring stability while high speed trains cruise on the track.
The 18 page joint note read, towards
Gorakhpur
side at 638/8-10 km, cloth pieces were inserted to fasten the rail with 72 clips. Further 140 clips were found in loose condition, 38 were out from their position and 10 were missing.
Similarly, 102 rubber pad which is used to create grip between concrete slipper and metal rail track were found missing, while 88 were out of their position.
Prior to the derailment, the train was cruising at 80 kmph. In the
accident
, four passengers were killed and around 29 were injured.
“The fastening of the rail track was not proper, so the rail track was not secure,” the report, written in Hindi, said.
The investigation team’s report said that the senior section engineer, ultrasound fault detection team, detected an IMR defect (immediate removal defect) at 1.30 pm and the Chandigarh-Dibrugarh Express crossed Motiganj station at 2.28 pm.
It said that at 2.30 pm, the station master of Motiganj was given a memorandum to put a speed restriction of 30 kmph for trains to cross the defective spot.
“When IMR was detected (at 1.30 pm), the site should have been protected till the caution order was served but it was not done due to which the train derailed. The engineering department is responsible for it,” the
joint probe
said.
Meanwhile P K Singh, the senior section engineer representing the engineering department, who was part of the six-member team for the preliminary finding, wrote a dissent note.
“I completely disagree with the joint note. It was incorrect to conclude that the site 638/16-14 km was not protected, because the IMR spot was completely fine and it was not the reason for the derailment,” he wrote.
Singh concluded that the train derailed because of improper braking by the loco pilot.
Pankaj Kumar Singh, CPRO, North Eastern Railway, said, “This joint note is not a finding of the train derailment, but a preliminary report which tells us how bad the condition of the accident site was. The actual finding would be done by the commissioner of railway safety (CRS), where every stakeholder will explain their part.”
The CRS will start an investigation into the derailment on Sunday.
Meanwhile, a member of the Railway Board told TOI on the condition of anonymity, “According to the joint note, it seems to be gross negligence in the maintenance of the track. However, it’s also true that several engineers across many divisions have time and again said that there is either no fund or miniscule fund for track renewal.”
Another senior official said, “When IMR detected, three days are given to change the defected rail track with a new one. However, by rule book, a caution memo should be issued as soon as possible to operate the train at 20-30 kpmh on the affected track, which was apparently not followed in this case.”
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