Indian Railways Oxygen Express loaded with LMO to reach Maharashtra from Vizag

In response to the fight against Covid-19, Indian Railways has geared up to run its Roll On-Roll Off (Ro-Ro) Oxygen Express to supply oxygen, collected at steel plants, to different parts of the country. On 19 April, 2021 the Central Railway green signalled a special Ro-Ro Service to Visakhapatnam to load up on oxygen for COVID-19 patients. Indian Railways Oxygen Express reaches Visakhapatnam Steel Plant today at 4:30 am.

The Mumbai Division team had built a ramp overnight at the Kalamboli Goods Yard to facilitate the loading/unloading of tankers from flat wagons. The Ro-Ro Service, with 7 empty tankers, departed from the Kalamboli Goods Yard for the Visakhapatnam Steel Plant siding at 8.05 pm on Wednesday night. This train moved via Vasai Road, Jalgaon, Nagpur, Raipur Jn enroute to Visakhapatnam Steel Plant siding in East Coast Railway (ECoR) zone. The objective was to get loaded at the steel plant with Liquid Medical Oxygen (LMO). It is also learned that this train had taken a special route to reach Vizag. Probably, this route was adopted to avoid the ghat sections on Central Railway’s Mumbai-Howrah, and Mumbai-Chennai, routes between Kasara-Igatpuri and Karjat-Lonavala respectively.

The first Indian Railways Roll On-Roll Off (Ro-Ro) Oxygen Express is now at the East Coast Railway(ECoR) with seven empty tankers from the Kalamboli Goods Yard in Maharashtra. It reached Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Limited, Visakhapatnam early on Thursday morning where the Liquid Medical Oxygen (LMO) is being filled into the empty tankers. About 15 tons of LMO will be loaded in each tanker. It will then be scheduled to move towards Maharashtra.

Indian Railways introduced the Roll-on-Roll-off (RO-RO) service during the year 1999 on Konkan Railway and since then it has been in use. This RO-RO model is useful as it helps in saving fuel and turnaround time. An initiative that was launched as an eco-friendly transport system has now turned to play a very important role during this national need of the hour. Indian Railways had transported essential commodities, and kept the supply chain intact, even during last year’s lockdown and continued to serve the Nation in times of emergencies. Today, the movement of the Oxygen Express, towards different parts of the country, will help patients and hospitals nationwide.