DISASTER MANAGEMENT EXERCISE AT KALYANI STATION
Kolkata, August 23, 2023
A grapevine in social media & conventional media was that a derailment had occurred at Kalyani station while in actuality it was a mock drill exercise organized by the Sealdah Division at Kalyani station. The capsized coach, SOS messages, and other protocols were followed as in real life so that Railway officers & staff could make an immediate response to the cause which will help in assessing the response time and ability to make proper decisions by on-duty field staff like Station Master, Inspectors, RPF & other frontline staff if any train accident happens at any place
Effective Disaster Management Exercise requires lots of training & exercise. Eastern Railway regularly organizes such disaster management exercises at different places to upgrade the skills and keep the crew in readiness to mitigate any crisis at a minimal time duration.
Though a mock drill for disaster management exercise is a planned action to upgrade the crisis management ability a section of media sometimes misinterprets the drill. Even today’s disaster management mock drill at Kalyani station organized by Sealdah Division is projected to be an untoward incident to some media people and they started enquiring about it. It is clarified that there was no untoward incident at Kalyani & it’s only a mock drill organized there creating a real-life-like appearance of a derailment involving a rescue team comprising of Railway staff, supervisors, officers, doctors, paramedics & NDRF team.
Today’s mock drill as a disaster management exercise started at Kalyani station at 2 p.m. and shall continue till evening so that staff at all levels get involved in the exercise which will make them more competent to control any crisis situation in the future.
