Hundreds of passengers of the Howrah-Hyderabad Falaknuma Superfast Express had a miraculous escape after a fire broke out in one of the reserved compartments and spread to adjacent bogies in the Bommaipalli-Pagidipalli section near Bibinagar railway station, about 50 km away on Friday.
The fire completely destroyed five sleeper cars, including S4, S5 and S6. The train was about two and a half hours late. The fire was noticed at about 11 a.m. and some passengers quickly pulled the alarm chain to stop the train. Sources said this was one of the factors that saved the passengers as almost all of them were awake and about to get off at Secunderabad.
While passengers jumped off as soon as the train stopped, many of them left behind their luggage, some with valuables and others with certificates. The mishap comes a couple of days after an accident at Odisha’s Bahanaga Bazaar station that claimed 288 lives.
Passengers in the train alerted the fire brigade, police and also railway emergency number 139, after which numerous teams, including Rachakonda police, Bhongir district administration, district disaster response units, railway police and RPF personnel rushed to the spot and started rescue operations.
After the operation was completed, DGP Anjani Kumar tweeted, “All passengers are safely evacuated and shifted to buses after fire broke out in Falaknuma Express near Bhongir rural border PS. Police, Fire and Railways are working in coordination.” No fatalities (sic) have been reported so far.”
DCP Bhongir M. Rajesh Chandra told Deccan Chronicle that the fire was brought under control in three hours. Meanwhile, the site was also visited by the Clues team and experts from TS FSL. After checking, they started screening the coaches which have since been diverted to Bibinagar station.
According to fire officials, they received an SOS at 11:17 a.m. and the fire brigade from Bhongir was the first to reach the spot. Tenders from Aleru, Yadagirigutta, Cherlapally, Ramannapet, Choutuppal were also pressed into service after assessing the intensity of the fire.
“Initially, 11 unaffected wards were disconnected as a precautionary measure. Firefighting began after the overhead power was disconnected in 30 minutes. Around 54,000 liters of water was used to douse the fire,” officials said.
On the complaint of Nalgonda Station Master, SI K. Salakamma of GRP Nalgonda registered a case of fire and started investigation. The railway management has also launched a parallel investigation.