Another incident involving NCC Ltd on Namma Metro Airport Line

BENGALURU: Following the tragedy in which a mother and her son were killed after an under-construction Metro pillar collapsed, it has come to light that this is the second such accident on the Metro’s Airport Line where contractor, NCC Limited, is carrying out the works. The earlier incident, which took place four months ago at Hennur casting yard, has been kept under wraps.

However, no one sustained any injuries, but the incident delayed work on crucial infrastructure on this stretch, said a reliable Metro source. The source said, “The earlier mishap occurred when the beam of the 250-tonne main gantry (a heavy static crane) broke when it was lifting a Ugirder.”

This was a major accident and work at the casting yard came to a standstill in the aftermath of the incident, and this impeded the rapid pace of infrastructure work for the Airport Line at that time. “Work could not progress for three months and it resumed again a month earlier,” he explained.

The reason for the incident was NCC Ltd, instead of using a new gantry, deployed a used gantry which was already used for other construction works. “The worn out state of it was the reason why it gave way,” the source said.

“The Hennur yard has so far readied around 60 girders and if the mishap had not occurred, it would have readied 200 girders,” he added. It caters to the requirements of Package One of the KR Puram-Hebbal- KIA line which runs from Benigenahalli to Kempapura. NCC Ltd has been awarded contracts for all three packages on the 37-km Airport line. No one at NCC Ltd could be reached for their comments.