Blue Line services impacted for 90 mins due to tech snag, says Delhi Metro

'Delay in services between Dwarka Sector 21 and Noida Electronic City/Vaishali. Normal service on all other lines,' tweets DMRC

A large number of commuters on Delhi Metro's Blue Line faced hardship for nearly an hour and a half on Monday as services across the corridor were impacted due to a technical snag, officials said.

Blue Line connects Dwarka Sector-21 in Delhi and Noida Electronic City, along with a branch line to Vaishali.

"Train services between Yamuna Bank and Indraprastha stations of the Blue Line were affected from 6.35 PM to 8 PM today to undertake repair work of a broken contact wire (part of OHE or overhead equipment) on the Up Line (going towards Dwarka) due to some external object (bird) hitting the OHE/pantograph of the train," the DMRC said in a statement.

The entire Blue Line was impacted in this period due to the snag in the OHE at the Yamuna Bank segment. Trains were run at a slower speed than usual in this duration.

The branch line to Vaishali diverges from the main Blue Line at Yamuna Bank metro station.

Commuters faced hardship and huge swarms of crowd were seen at several stations, particularly at Indraprastha metro station.

Many passenger took to Twitter to share the hardship they experienced soon after the snag was reported.

Twitter user @shamimua shared a picture of a crowded concourse at Rajiv Chowk metro station, also an interchange facility on the Blue Line.

"Blue line disrupted. Heavy rush at Rajiv chowk. Passengers are advised to take alternative routes," the user tweeted.

Another user, @Munmun_Bhat also tweeted and shared pictures: "Technical snag stated as reason of stoppage of metro train for the last 30 minutes on Blue Line by @OfficialDMRCofficial at Indraprastha Metro Station. Hundreds of commuters stranded at the station & waiting for another train to arrive".

"@OfficialDMRC too much crowd at Rajouri Garden Blue line metro platform. One Metro T3C25 GET FAULTY," @OyePahaadi tweeted.

Another commuter, @shreyanshpriyam tweeted while sharing picture of a large gathering of passengers at a station on the Blue Line: "@OfficialDMRC Staff don't know how to manage crowd. Technical Glitch -> Metro Services Halted -> No Crowd Management -> Overcrowding on platforms. DELHI METRO MAIN AAPKA SWAGAT HAI. COVID PROTOCOLS? @ArvindKejriwal @MoHFW_INDIA #delhimetro #blueline".

The DMRC said that during this period of about 90 minutes, train services were temporarily not available between Indraprastha and Yamuna Bank stations due to the absence of OHE resulting from the breakdown of contact wire due to bird hit.

"Normal train services were continuously available on rest of the sections of Blue Line during this period in two loops i.e., from Yamuna Bank to Vaishali/Noida Electronic City and Indraprastha to Dwarka Sec-21 sections," it said.

A shuttle train service was provided to allow commuting of passengers between Indraprastha and Yamuna Bank stations during this period, officials said.

Normal services on the entire Blue Line from Dwarka Sec-21 to Noida Electronic City/Vaishali was resumed from 8 PM onwards," the DMRC said.