Two more oxygen tankers from West Bengal arrive in Kochi
KOCHI: The Motor Vehicles Department (MVD, which had set out on an ambitious mission to transport Liquified Medical Oxygen (LMO) from a steel plant in West Bengal to Kochi, managed to complete the mission successfully when the final two tankers arrived here on on Saturday, While the first truck with 9 tonnes of LMO arrived here on Thursday, the remaining trucks drove in here on Saturday evening after covering the distance of over 2,500km in five days.
Though the earlier plan was to airlift the three trucks from West Bengal, it was later dropped owing to the adverse weather conditions due to Tauktae cyclone. The government also deployed three KSRTC drivers and an assistant motor vehicle inspector on the mission.
“From the beginning, the mission was really a challenging one as we encountered several issues in Odisha and Andhra Pradesh. The district administration there didn’t allow us to transport oxygen as they too faced a shortage. Even the district collector and the transport commissioner there also intervened. We are heaving a sigh of relief since the mission could be successfully completed,” said B Shefiq, Joint Regional Transport Officer, who was in charge of the mission.
Earlier, after the state’s oxygen reserves became depleted, the government decided to send three trucks to the Tata Steel Plant in Burnpur. Following this, the MVD siezed three tankers from multinational companies which supplied Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) for the Petronet LNG in Kochi. The Petroleum and Explosives Safety Organisation (PESO) had given exemption to use the vehicle to transport the LMO after converting the tanker.
Meanwhile, the team which carried out the mission said they were ready to undertake a fresh mission. “Our entire team is ready for the mission again. Though we started from scratch, we were able to finish the mission,” Shefiq added.