30 October,2022 07:19 AM IST | Mumbai | Rajendra B. Aklekar
The broken nose. Pic/Bhavesh Dave
The Mumbai-Ahmedabad Vande Bharat Express Train 18 suffered a cattle runover incident again, this time near Atul station, on Saturday morning. This is the third such reported incident involving this semi-high-speed train so far this month.
"The train was on its journey from Mumbai Central to Gandhinagar on October 29. The incident occurred at 8.17 am and the train was detained for about 15 minutes. There is no damage to the train, except on the nose cone cover of the front coach, i.e. the driver coach. The train is running smoothly. This will be attended to, at the earliest," Western Railway chief public relations officer Sumit Thakur said.
A WR spokesperson said that the railways is looking at future solutions. "We are upgrading the Mumbai-Delhi route to 160 kmph. As a part of this, we are upgrading tracks, assets, bridges and even fencing. The target is March 2024."
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Collisions with cattle on the tracks are unavoidable and this has been kept in mind, while designing the semi-high-speed Vande Bharat train, Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw had told mediapersons earlier this month. The Mumbai-Gandhinagar Vande Bharat Express started its commercial run on October 1, a day after it was flagged off by PM Narendra Modi in Gujarat's capital, Gandhinagar.
Speaking with mid-day earlier, Sudhanshu Mani, who created the Vande Bharat Train 18, had said that the train had been designed keeping all such factors in mind. "A nose with even the strongest material and backing structural frame would get damaged in cattle runover cases at high speed, unless you employ some super-strong design which would be prohibitively expensive. Use of a cattle guard would spoil the USP of the aerodynamic profile of the train and its inherent aesthetics. Fencing of track is necessary," said Mani, who is retired GM of the Indian Railways' biggest coach factory, Integral Coach Factory (ICF).
