Coach of Shatabdi to Dehradun catches fire, no injuries: Railways

A bogie of the Dehradun-bound Shatabdi Express caught fire near the Kansro railway station between Haridwar and Dehradun on Saturday. All the 35 passengers of the coach were evacuated safely and no casualty or injury was reported, railway authorities said.

According to railway officials, the C-5 coach of the New Delhi-Dehradun Shatabdi Express caught fire on the Raiwal-Kansro section around 12.40 pm after the train left the Haridwar railway station. “All 35 passengers of the coach were safely shifted to other coaches by the railway staff. Affected coach was separated from the train,” an official said.

The 14-bogie train had only 316 passengers at the time of incident as most of the passengers had deboarded at Haridwar and other stations. DRM, Moradabad, Tarun Prakash said that all the passengers were shifted to other coaches for the train to proceed and reach Dehradun at 3 pm.

The DRM said the cause of the incident was uncertain. A senior official has been deputed to look into the incident and a forensic team from Dehradun too has been engaged, he said. “Incident occurred at around 12.40 pm. All the passengers are safe and no casualty of injury occurred in the incident,” the DRM said.

After the incident, two Dehradun-bound trains — one arriving from Gorakhpur and another from Subedarganj — were terminated at Raiwala railway station and the passengers were sent to Dehradun by buses.

Bogies which were behind the affected coach in Shatabdi Express have been stationed at Raiwala station and the track has been opened to traffic, another official said.

Raiwala police station officer Amarjeet Singh Rawat said the passengers who were in the affected coach were in a state of panic but they were safely evacuated along with their belongings and shifted to other coaches.