Odisha Mishap: LHB coaches not full-proof against derailments, but safer than ICF

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By Our Special Correspondent

New Delhi, June 8: The Balasore rail mishap involving three trains has turned the spotlight back on the railway safety. The retired railway officials are lensing areas that need attention for the safe running of the trains.

Conventional wisdom in the Ministry of Railways and shared by the officials favoured the LHB (Linke Hoffman Busch) coaches for safe running of the trains. The LHB coaches were initially part of the premium trains in the country such as Rajdhani Express and now several other premium trains boast of these coaches which are made of stainless steel.

“Stainless steel has been a metal of choice in manufacturing Railway coaches and train sets like Vande Bharat in India for last 7-8 years. Choice of stainless steel for Rail coach manufacturing was vindicated on comparing the visuals received from Balasore accident site with visuals of Gaisal accident,” wrote Lalit Chandra Trivedi, a former zonal General Manager of the Railways in his Linkedin post.

The Gaisal rail accident involved Brahmaputa Mail and Aawdh Asam Mail colliding against each other on account of signaling failure which made them run on the same track in 1999.

Sharing photographs of Gaisal and Balasore rail mishaps, Trivedi commented: “It can be seen from the visuals of Balasore accident site that while stainless steel LHB coaches post-accident have retained their shapes and have not crumpled, and in comparison, non-stainless steel ICF coaches, which were involved in the Gaisal accident site, had piled up over each other and lost their shape.”

He said that the ICF coaches in the Gaisal mishap led to higher number of casualties despite the fact that it was a collision between two trains unlike Balasore where three trains were involved.
The Balasore mishap involved two passenger trains – Coromondel Express and Yeshwantpur-Howrah Express – and a goods train. “Both the passenger trains in the Balasore mishap consisted of LHB coaches only,” said Amitabh Sharma, the spokesperson of the Ministry of Railways.

Sharma said that the India is no more manufacturing the ICF coaches. “Currently, only LHB coaches are being manufactured. But I don’t have data currently with me on number of trains still running with the ICF coaches,” added Sharma. Trivedi noted in his post that the rail coaches invariably carry more people than the capacity. “Unlike developed world, in India due to population pressures and rapid rise in intra-country migration of population seeking jobs elsewhere, away from their native places the number of persons in a coach frequently are more than the designed capacity,” added Trivedi.
He said that “under the circumstances stainless steel is better equipped to bear the stresses arising due to dense crush loading (an indigenous term coined to convey the extent of over-crowding in Indian Railway coaches)”.