BENGALURU: The major fiasco in train operations across the City with the Shatabdi Express running over the 24-year-old Shabaz Ahmad Sharif who trespassed on the railway tracks near Tyakal station (60 kms from Bengaluru) in Kolar district on Wednesday could have been averted if specific railway officials in the Traction department had simply done what was expected of them in a crisis.
Railway sources reveal that an eagle got electrocuted when it was caught in the equipment above the loco of a goods train at Yelahanka when it was moving to Krishnarajapuram at 5.12 am.
"Due to this, the entire electrical apparatus in the Bengaluru Division tripped. In such situations, the Traction Power Control room, located on the first floor of the Divisional Railway Manager's office (near the KSR station) gets an alert on the panel. Staff in Control room are expected to monitor everything 24x7," said a top railway source.
"In this specific instance, someone has failed to act on the alert received. Ideally, the power supply to this single line leading from Yelahanka to Channasandra should have been isolated. It would have stopped train operations here. Since this was not done and there was a delay, the problem spread across the grid network bringing all electrical operations to a halt," he added.
The death of the youngster and the complete chaos in train schedules all morning was completely a man-made one due to lack of immediate action to control the damage, the source reiterated.
"There are incidents of birds getting hit and affecting train operations on and off but they impact a few trains as quick action is generally taken. For one, the eagle is a huge bird as compared to regular bird hits encountered by us. Apart from that, there was a massive human error in not responding promptly," the source explained.
Asked about the reasons behind the power supply failure, Divisional Railway Manager, Bengaluru Division, Shyam Singh, said, "It is under investigation."