Driverless train incident fallout: Railways launches special counselling drive for loco pilots
Northern Railway zone launched a 15-day long special drive from February 25 to counsel the loco pilots and assistant loco pilots to strictly follow norms regarding stabilising engines after working hours.
A written instruction, addressed to chief loco inspectors (CLIs) and lobby in-charge of various stations, detailed the recent incident of driverless running of a freight train for about 75 km between Jammu and Pathankot and said the present counselling drive aims at avoiding recurrence of such incidents in future.
It directed the CLIs to train the loco pilots and assistant loco pilots that instead of coming out of the engine and leaving it unmanned, they should hand over or take over the charge inside it.
It further asked them to seriously follow general and subsidiary rules (G&SR) of stabilising the engine and do not show any carelessness.
The G&SR norms have eight directions for a loco pilot to follow while stabilising an engine. Some of them are applying hand brakes and loco brakes, shutting down all circuits and applying wooden wedges on wheels among others.
After the drive gets over, CLIs have been asked to send a report on March 11 about total inspections conducted and deficiencies observed. CLIs are also supposed to report the action taken to remove deficiencies.
According to the instruction, on February 25, a divisional material train ran on its own because the driver came out of the engine in a hurry and did not shut down the loco according to the norms. It said even the station staff did not follow
