BALASORE: Hospitals in Balasore were overwhelmed as injured passengers started pouring in from the crash site from 8 pm on Friday till Saturday forenoon. After the wards and corridors of Balasore district headquarters hospital (DHH) were filled with the injured, hundreds of passengers with minor injuries were shifted to some of the Kalyan Mandaps in the town.
The DHH appeared as a war zone medical facility as injured passengers were seen getting treated on stretchers and in overcrowded rooms. The situation was no better at Soro, Bahanaga, Khantapara and Gopalpur community health centres. The chaos was beyond imagination as doctors and paramedics literally fought to save lives despite strained manpower.
The hospital authorities mobilised doctors and medical staff from peripheral health facilities and transformed the campus of the DHH into an open health facility. Though attending all injured at a time was a herculean task, the deployed medical staff raced against time to save as many lives as possible.
“More than 300 injured passengers were moved to the hospital within a few hours. It was challenging for us. I had never seen a tragedy of such a scale. After coordinating with the physicians engaged in treatment, we rushed to the spot with a team of doctors to attend to the injured and supervise the whole exercise,” said Balasore CDMO Dr Dulalsen Jagdeb.
Volunteers rose to the occasion and gathered at the DHH to donate blood. At least 500 bottles of blood were collected during the night itself. Medical camps were opened along both sides of the road that connects NH 16 with Bahanaga Bazar station.
ADMO (public health) Dr Mrutyunjay Mishra, who was at the spot, said over 360 passengers were initially shifted to different hospitals where 57 succumbed to injuries and the rest were undergoing treatment. “Besides, our team had recovered more than 210 bodies till 4.30 am. I have been at the spot since 9 pm. The rescue operation is over now and there are no injured passengers left,” he said. As many as 1175 injured passengers were shifted to both public and private hospitals.