Mechanical and human errors led to the train tragedy in Odisha: Railways probe report
In his report submitted to the Railway Board last week, AM Chowdhary, Commissioner of Railway Safety, South Eastern Circle, Kolkata, wrote that faulty signalling, botched repairs and lack of remedial action after “a similar incident of mismatch [of signals]” just 18 days before led to the deadly train accident near Bahanaga Bazar railway station in Balasore district of Odisha on June 2.
First, two coaches of the Yesvantpur-Howrah Express derailed. These then came in the path of the speeding Coromandel Express on the adjoining track and collided with it. A goods train was also hit in the process.
The evening accident claimed at least 293 lives and caused injuries to over 900 people, making it one of the worst train accidents in India.
The report said that that wires inside a location box were wrongly labelled during repair work in 2018. This error remained undetected for years, leading to a mix-up during repair work done hours before the accident.
These two have been found to be primary causes of the accident in the report Chowdhary submitted to the Railway Board.
With regard to the wrong labelling in 2018, the probe found that a wiring diagram—meant to guide technicians on how the wiring is to be reconnected after maintenance work—was changed on paper and duly approved as early as 2015, but was not corrected physically.
The report also points to the station master of Bahanaga Bazar railway station for failing to detect “abnormal behaviour” of the signalling control system which could have prevented the tragedy.
The report further says: “It is also learnt … that there was a similar incident of mismatch [of signals] between the intended route set by signals, and actual route taken by train, on May 15 at Bankranayabaz Station in Kharagpur Division of South Eastern Railway, on account of wrong wiring and cable fault”.
Had corrective measures been taken after the incident on May 15, the accident 18 days later would not have happened, the report concludes.
Meanwhile, the prime minister continues with his Vande Bharat train inauguration spree. Five such trains were flagged off last week, even as more than 80 of the bodies from the train accident remain unidentified.
