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ID:	3060

Date:	25-08-2017

Headline:	Mill workers came to the rescue of Utkal passengers

Writer:	ISMA
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Workers from the nearby sugar mill arrived immediately with their equipment Hours before the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) arrived at the accident site near the Khatauli railway station in Uttar Pradesh, hundreds of workers of a nearby sugar mill were among the first to come to the rescue of the trapped passengers of the Puri-Haridwar Utkal Express. Minutes after the train derailed, at 5.50 p.m. Saturday, Triveni Sugar Mill vice-president (sugar) Ashok Kumar called up sub-divisional magistrate Kanhai Singh and offered him help in the rescue. “Incidentally, our workers were about to go home at the end of their shift. But the moment we got to know of the derailment, we started mobilising our resources... We rescued around 100 passengers trapped in the coaches,” Dr. Kumar said. The first three teams of the NDRF left their Ghaziabad camp — 80 km from the site — at 6.30-7 p.m. However, since seven of the 13 derailed coaches had overturned, many passengers were trapped, and immediate rescue measures were necessary to save lives. “Before the NDRF teams arrived, residents living on both sides of the track rushed to rescue the passengers. Many workers from the nearby mill who were well trained in cutting arrived immediately with their equipment. As it was getting dark, the mill also gave generators to supply electricity to ensure better visibility,” Mr. Kanhai Singh said. Around 100-150 workers rushed to the site nearly 500 metres away from the mill. “We provided lighting arrangements and around 10-15 cutters to cut through the coaches and take out the passengers,” Dr. Kumar said. “Our target was to cut open the window grill of the coaches so that we could free the passengers straight out of the window because our cutting equipment could not break the coaches,” said Anwar Alam, who works at the mill. “We started off with the S2 coach that crashed into a house near Khatauli, leaving the passengers stuck. We managed to save 10-12 persons from this coach,” he said. Sushant Thakur, assistant general manager (administration and security) at Triveni, said the mill provided 25 halogen lights for proper lighting at the site for the mill workers engaged in the rescue. “Our medical officers were present there to provide immediate assistance to the injured passengers and we deployed our ambulances too,” he said. “The responsive passengers were pulled out of the window, but for those who were deep inside the coaches, cutting equipment was used,” he said. Finally, at 9 p.m., three NDRF teams arrived and used their high-end cutting tools to rescue the remaining passengers. “The NDRF teams cordoned off the area and rescued the passengers more expeditiously,” Mr. Singh said.

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