Itarsi station's fire troubles over 100 trains

Due to the fire that occurred on Wednesday, the rail traffic has been thrown in to chaos. The fire has caused the collapse of the signaling system. The fire occurred in the Route Relaying Interlocking (RRI) cabin of Itarsi station (one of the biggest railway junctions in India).

More than four dozen trains within the busy Itarsi-Nagpur track were affected since Wednesday morning following reports of fireplace in signalling system at Itarsi railway station. Consequently, several alternative trains to and from Bhopal are affected and ran late by few hours. Additionally many were cancelled, terminated and diverted through various alternative routes.

Bhopal division professional Iowa Siddiqui stated that the Route relay interlocking (RRI) system at Itarsi station caught fire at 5.45am. It had been most likely due to a short circuit. However, the precise cause is still to be found. Railway traffic in entire country has been affected. Also, it’s unclear till when this disruption would persist.

Route Relay Interlocking (RRI) is the system utilized in large and busy stations that ought to handle high volumes of train movements. In this, a whole route through the station is selected and all the associated points and signals on the route is set at once by a switch for receiving, holding, blocking, or dispatching trains.

A part of RRI was supposed to be replaced in 1998, however, it had been not done and this could have caused the contact, railway sources said.

Image Credit: 25 Cents FC at English Wikipedia / CC BY 3.0

Image Reference: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Itarsi_Railway_Station.jpg