Delhi: For second straight day, signalling woes hit Blue Line

Complaints started pouring in during peak morning hours as office goers boarded the trains, unaware that the system, which had completely come to a halt for around 30 minutes on December 5, had not returned to normalcy yet.

Trains were frequently losing contact with the Operations Control Centre (OCC) due to the glitch. The OCC, where train movements and related systems are continuously monitored on a giant screen, is akin to the Air Traffic Controller in airports.

According to Metro chief spokesman Anuj Dayal, repair work was completed between the Barakhamba Road and Dwarka Sector 21 stations on Wednesday night: “Around 17 engineers were deputed to reboot the system through the night. Work was mostly left in the stretch between Yamuna Bank and Vaishali.”

Accordingly, trains ran on two separate loops — between Dwarka Sector 21-Noida City Centre and Yamuna Bank-Vaishali. Due to this, those going towards Vaishali had no option but to board Noida-bound trains and change at Yamuna Bank to make their onward journeys.

“It is a software-related problem. Work is actually complete, but we are keeping the system under observation for some more time,” Dayal said. He added that the signalling system belongs to Siemens and log records of the glitches have been forwarded to the company’s headquarters in Germany for a detailed analysis.

Trains are running with a frequency of 3 minutes and 30 seconds on the Dwarka-Noida section, while the frequency on Yamuna Bank-Vaishali section is 5 minutes and 30 seconds.