Konkan Railway starts review of all cuttings along route

Sunday's incident on Konkan Railway involving a JCB and Jan Shatabdi Express has resulted in authorities reviewing all the cuttings along their route. On Sunday, 16 people sustained injuries when a JCB fell on the passing Mumbai-bound train.

"Within three days we will survey all the cuttings along our track to check if it endangers train operations," said Bhanu P Tayal, chairman and managing director of Konkan Railway. There are around 564 cuttings along the 738km stretch.

In engineering parlance, cuttings are earth, soil or rock excavated or blasted from hill or mountain to make way for road, rail line or a canal at locations where tunnels cannot be constructed or tunnels are an expensive alternative.

If any anomaly is found at any of the cuttings, the authorities will take measures to widen the gap from the tracks. Apart from it, fencing will also be done as an additional precaution.

However, Tayal said it will not be asking any quarry to stop operations temporarily or permanently. Sources at Kankavali informed that the incident occurred due to failure of the axle of the JCB working at the stone quarry. Once the axle broke, the driver of the machine was unable to control it, thereby falling off the cutting on to the track and eventually hitting the train.