NEW DELHI (Metro Rail News): Giving major assistance to the country in the wake of rising corona crises and overcoming the shortage of oxygen supply across various States battling Covid-19, Indian Railways has delivered till now more than 15284 MT of Liquid Medical Oxygen (LMO) through more than 936 tankers to various States across India.
A total of 234 Oxygen Expresses have completed their journey so far and brought relief to various States. First Oxygen Express to Assam with 80 MT of LMO in 4 tankers reached Assam on 23rd May. Delivery of Liquid Medical Oxygen (LMO) by Oxygen Expresses to Karnataka crossed 1000 MT. Oxygen Expresses have been delivering more than 800 MT of LMO to the Nation each day now.
Oxygen relief by Oxygen Expresses reached out to 14 states namely Uttarakhand, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Haryana, Telangana, Punjab, Kerala, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Assam.
According to Ministry of Railways, till date a total of 614 MT of Oxygen has been offloaded in Maharashtra, nearly 3609 MT in Uttar Pradesh, 566 MT in Madhya Pradesh, 4300 MT in Delhi, 1759 MT in Haryana, 98 MT in Rajasthan, 1063 MT in Karnataka, 320 MT in Uttarakhand, 857 MT in Tamil Nadu, 642 MT in Andhra Pradesh, 153 MT in Punjab, 246 MT in Kerala, 976 MT in Telangana and 80 MT in Assam.
It is Indian Railways endeavour to deliver as much LMO as possible in the shortest time possible to the requesting States. Criss crossing the country, Indian Railways is picking up oxygen from places like Hapa , Baroda, Mundra in the West and Rourkela, Durgapur, Tatanagar, Angul in the East and then delivering it to States of Uttarakhand, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Haryana, Telangana, Punjab, Kerala, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh & Assam in complex operational route planning scenarios.
In order to ensure that Oxygen relief reaches in the fastest time possible, Railways is creating new standards and unprecedented benchmarks in running of Oxygen Express Freight Trains. The average speed of these critical Freight trains is way above 55 in most cases over long distances. Running on high priority Green Corridor, with the highest sense of urgency, operational teams of various zones are working round the clock in most challenging circumstances to ensure that Oxygen reaches in the fastest possible time frame. Technical Stoppages have been reduced to 1 minute for crew changes over different sections.
Tracks are kept open and high alertness is maintained to ensure that Oxygen Express keeps zipping through. All this is done in a manner that speed of other Freight Operation doesn’t get reduced as well.
