NEW DELHI: Thousands of commuters on one of the busiest Metro lines, Blue, were left hassled on Wednesday as train services were affected twice due to signalling issue on different sections of the corridor. The Operations Control Centre (OCC) lost the automatic signaling twice, which resulted in the movement of trains being controlled manually. This led to bunching of trains on the Blueline for the first time between 3 to 3:30 pm during the afternoon in the Karol Bagh-Dwarka section first. The intermittent signalling problem was resolved at 4:23 pm.
Later, around seven in the evening the same glitch occurred again. Due to the holdup which affected the entire Blueline, commuters had to face problems as in a few areas the Metros stopped in the middle of the track for almost half to one hour. The Metro stations of Rajiv Chowk, Yamuna Bank and Mandi House saw packed platforms as a result of the long delay in train services.
“The view and control of the signaling and Automatic Train Control system on Blue Line at Operations Control Centre (OCC) is intermittently getting lost today between Karol Bagh and Dwarka section. As a result, trains are being locally controlled as and when such loss happens. It results in bunching/hold up of trains for brief spells,” said a DMRC official. The train services during the evening had similar problem which reduced the frequency of the trains to five to eight minutes, down from the usually two minute.