Indian Railways has cancelled the operation of Howrah-Puri Vande Bharat Express on May 22, 2023 (today). This is the country’s 17th Vande Bharat Express. The move comes following the damages caused by the thunderstorm on Sunday.
In a statement, the South Eastern Railway (SER) officials said, “The train will remain cancelled due to repairs of damages caused by a thunderstorm on May 21, 2023 in Cuttack-Bhadrak section of East Coast Railway (ECoR).” The train was delayed for more than five hours.
On Sunday, the blue and white colour train suffered huge damages during a storm in Odisha’s Jajpur district. Tree branches fell on the train and got entangled with its pantograph, bringing the train to a halt. It also cracked the windshield and thereby it
The incident took place around 16:45 hrs between Baitarani Road and Manjuri Road stations, near the Jajpur Keonjhar Road station. The train was stranded there for more than three hours. Later, the railways pressed diesel engines into the service. The diesel engine brought the semi-high speed train upto Manjuri road. From Manjuri Rd, the train operated normally.
This ultra modern train was flagged off by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on May 18, 2023. It commenced its commercial operation from Saturday onwards.
In addition to this, the South Eastern Railway (SER) zone has rescheduled the journey time of a few trains. This is due to the late running of the link train.
Train Rescheduled:-
- 22863 Howrah-Sir M Visvesvaraya Terminal (Bengaluru) Express – The train will leave HWH at 13:00 hrs instead of 10:50 hrs.
- 22857 Santragachi – Anand Vihar Express – The train will leave Santragachi at 15:00 hrs instead of 10:00 hrs.
- 20815 Tatanagar – Visakhapatnam Express – The train will leave Tatanagar at 09:50 hrs instead of 07:20 hrs.