After the cyclone weakened, South Central Railway (SCR) operated two special trains on Monday from Hyderabad to Kakinada and from Tirupati to Tuni to clear stranded passengers, besides restoring the damaged tracks.
Authorities claimed train.No.02728 Hyderabad-Kakinada Town special train departed Hyderabad at 5.15 p.m. and was operated as per the timings of train no 12728 Godavari Express between Hyderabad and Samalkot. Train no. 07487 Tirupati-Tuni Special Train departed Tirupati at 8.50 p.m. and was run as per the timings and stoppages of train 17487 Tirumala Express between Tirupati and Tuni.
In view of breaches to railway track near Elamanchili on Vijayawada – Visakhapatnam rail route in Vijayawada Division, train services to and from Visakhapatnam got affected on Monday and services to Visakhapatnam are likely to be restored on Tuesday.
The long distance Express trains towards Howrah are being operated on diverted route via Vijayawada – Kazipet – Balharshah – Nagpur – Jharsiguda – Kharagpur. Except for the section from Samalkot to Visakhapatnam, train services have been running continuously on all other routes on SCR in spite of cyclone ‘Hudhud’ in the last few days.
In addition to this, SCR has taken up the track restoration activities on war-footing basis. As many as 9 special material trains were mobilized from Vijayawada and the adjoining Secunderabad, Guntur and Guntakal Divisions to the breached spots.
To speed up the restoration activities, a team of Principal Heads of Departments led by SCR General Manager P.K.Srivastava proceeded to Elamanchili by a special train from Secunderabad on Monday morning. The General Manager is closely monitoring the track restoration activities in the field and directed the officials to open up the section to rail traffic in the earliest possible time.
Further, two special trains - one from Gudur and the other from Vijayawada, carrying 280 additional departmental labour-force was run to the affected location on priority, authorities claimed.
Meanwhile, APSRTC resumed services on the Hyderabad to Visakhapatnam route from Mahatma Gandhi Bus Station. Though, everyday 17 buses are operated on the route, on Monday evening five buses were operated and more buses would be operated as per the demand, said an RTC official.
