Heavy rains disrupt services on CR, several long-distance services rescheduled, diverted

Mumbai: The Central Railway (CR) witnessed its first monsoon rail disruption on Sunday. Several long-distance trains were diverted, rescheduled or short-terminated due to waterlogging amid heavy rains on tracks between the Kalyan-Kasara stations.

CR, which was already carrying out a mega block on the Thane-Diva section, had to cancel the mega block due to a mudslide on the tracks near Atgaon around 5:30 am. Sources from CR stated that by 6:20 am, the engineering department declared it unsafe for trains to operate, resulting in the disruption of train services on the Asangaon-Kasara stretch.

“There were multiple problems across stretches due to heavy rains. The mudslide was on the Down line towards Kasara between Atgaon and Thansit. Later, Khadavli-Titwala stretch trains were detained from 6.30 am after the pantograph of the overhead electric pole (OHE) cable broke, In the evening, there was also water logging at Kalamboli,” said a senior CR official. The tracks were declared safe at 12.30 pm and traffic returned to normal with restricted speed on the section at 1 pm.

Heavy rainfall and flash floods in the Vasind-Khardi section were reported between 3am to 6am. At 8.15am, the Chief PRO for Central Railway, Dr Swapnil Nila, said that in the Up direction (towards CSMT), the OHE Pole tilted, and the pantograph got entangled near Vasind. “The Down track movement was given safe, and movement started with restricted speed,” he said.

The CR officials said the Up track was given safe at 12.30 pm with speed restrictions on this corridor. However, the passengers said the trains were moving slowly and utterly crowded as well. The mudslide was so bad that it took a few hours to remove the muck manually from rail tracks.

Around 30 long-distance trains including Vande Bharat, diverted via the Panvel-Karjat-Kalyan-Vasai route or short-terminated at Igatpuri. The CR authorities also rescheduled the timings of at least 12 long-distance trains. Sources said that due to the alertness of Loco Pilots of 12106 Vidarbha Express and 12138 Punjab Mail, the damage to the track embankment was detected and trains stopped safely. The CR authorities said that the Down track between Kalyan–Kasara was cleared at 7.40 am with restricted speed.

The CR authorities distributed biscuits, bottled water, and snacks to stranded passengers inside long-distance trains. “I took the train to Titwala from Kalyan. It was extremely crowded. The gap between train services was too much, and there were a lot of inconveniences as heavy rains had caused waterlogging in parts of MMR,” said Prafulla Shevale, member of the Kalyan-Kasara-Karjat Rail Passengers Association.

The suburban local trains were also impacted, which were running late by 20-30 minutes when trains on Kalyan-Kasara were running slow. Eventually, it came down to 10 minutes.