Gudur-Chennai rail link restored, cancellation of some trains continue

Water is still flowing above the danger level on Bridge No. 167 between Tada and Sullurpet stations on the Gudur-Chennai section, apart from a bank slip between Yellakuru and Venkatagiri stations.

The Gudur-Chennai Railway link has been restored, but South Central Railway continued to cancel and reschedule over a dozen of its services on Wednesday too, faced with the problem of heavy rains and overflowing water on the Gudur-Chennai section and related problems at other locations.

Water is still flowing above the danger level on Bridge No. 167 between Tada and Sullurpet stations on the Gudur-Chennai section, apart from a bank slip between Yellakuru and Venkatagiri stations and Vendodu-Kondagunta stations and derailment between Nandalur-Mantampalli on the Guntakal division. Also, the cancellations were effected due to non-availability of pairing rakes for some trains.

The SCR continued operating helplines at Secunderabad with the numbers 040-27786770, 040-27788846, 040-27788889 and 040-27786539 for the benefit of passengers, friends and relatives to know details about the running of trains. According to a press release on Wednesday, train no. 02510 Kamakhya-Bangalore Cantonment Suvidha special was cancelled as also no. 17644 Kakinada Port-Chennai Circar Express scheduled to leave at 2.20 p.m. on November 18 due to non-availability of pairing rake.

Others include no. 12761 Tirupati-Karimnagar Express (scheduled to leave at 10.40 p.m.), no. 12552 Kamakhya-Yeshvantpur AC express ( 2 p.m.), no. 12840 Chennai Central-Howrah Mail (11.45 p.m.) as also nos. 12841/12842 Howrah-Chennai Central-Howrah Coromandel express (8.45 a.m. & 2.50 p.m.), no. 13352 Alleppey-Dhanbad Express (6 a.m.), no. 22604 Villupuram-Kharagpur Express (11.40 a.m.) and no. 17488 Visakapatnam-Tirupati Tirumala Express (2 p.m.).

Also cancelled on Nov. 18 were no. 12516 Guwahati-Trivandrum (6.20 a.m.), no. 06335 Guwahati-Kochuvelli special (11.35 p.m.), no. 08301 Sambalpur-Yesvantapur special (8.50 a.m.), no. 12245 Howrah-Yesvantpur Doronto Express (11 a.m.), no. 02841 Santragachi-Chennai Central Special scheduled to depart Santragachi at 7 p.m. no. 02848 Chennai Central-Howrah Special (5.10 p.m.), no. 18464 Bangalore-Bhubaneshwar Prashanti Express (2 p.m.), no. 57273 Hubli-Tirupati passenger (11 a.m.), no. 07324 Hubli-Chennai Central special (8.20 p.m.).

The runs of two more trains on Nov. 20 - no. 15630 Guwahati-Chennai Central (3 p.m.) and no. 08302 Yesvantpur-Sambalpur (12.30 a.m.), were also cancelled, while no. 11011 Mumbai LTT-H.S. Nanded of Wednesday, scheduled to leave at 12.05 p.m., was rescheduled to leave at 5 a.m. on Thursday.

GM-SCR visits various locations:

Meanwhile, senior officials of the SCR are leveraging every resource available to them to get the required logistics in place to handle the emergency with the least possible inconvenience to people including the travelling passengers.

On Tuesday, General Manager Ravindra Gupta accompanied by DRM Guntakal, Mallya and Principal Chief Engineer of the Zone, S.K. Singh visited Vendodu station and the sites of two breaches in Renigunta-Gudur section. He reviewed the operational issues and spent a while at various spots. On Wednesday also, he visited the said locations to ensure that issues were resolved.

Gudur-Chennai section was cleared for traffic on Tuesday evening while on the SCR, the Gudur and Manugolu breaches were repaired by using over 100 people and a dozen senior officers and traffic was restored with speed restrictions of 20 kmph between the two locations.