Set to open next month, Metro carries out safety drills

The station officer and ticket selling officer shall check tokens and cards manually at gate to clear crowd.

In its first phase, the Metro will run along the 11.4-km Versova-Andheri-Ghatkopar stretch. express

With the city’s first monorail having received a much larger-than-expected turnout, the Mumbai Metro One Pvt Ltd (MMOPL), in charge of the city’s first Metro corridor which is likely to be commissioned next month, is also gearing up to handle a very large number of passengers in emergency situations.

The consortium, consisting of Reliance Infrastructure, Veolia Transport and the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA), expects to cater to nearly 7 lakh passengers during the first year of service of the 11.4-km Versova-Andheri-Ghatkopar corridor.

Along with regular safety preparedness such as drills to check portable fire extinguishers, water pipelines, ventilation systems and drafting a disaster control manual, officials are preparing for eventualities such as the collapse of the Automatic Fare Collection system in case of crowding. The consortium has planned for additional security to be deployed at the gate in case of such a situation.

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“The station officer and ticket selling officer shall check tokens and cards manually at gate to clear crowd. The operations control centre shall be informed to announce at the other stations to mitigate the discrepancy of tokens and cards,” an MMOPL spokesperson said.

In case of the monorail, nearly 20,000 commuters used the system on the first day and there was glitches with the ticketing system with many commuters complaining of tokens getting over and officials having to hurriedly prepare and issue paper tickets.

The MMOPL spokesperson said all 12 Metro stations have been designed in such a way that passengers could be evacuated in four minutes in case of an emergency and are equipped with an inert gas fire suppression system along with regular extinguishers. He said platforms and concourses had been equipped with emergency doors while stations were provided with doors that could be remotely opened. The consortium has appointed a separate disaster control team to tackle crises situations.

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