Train communication with Dhaka and rest of the country resumed on Friday following the derailment of Panchagarh-bound train shortly after it had left Dhaka’s Kamalapur station late Thursday.
The Panchagarh Express was the last train on the departure schedule from the station on Thursday.
The train left it around 12:05am and derailed within 25 minutes in the Shahjahanpur area, snapping rail communication.
Though there were scheduled trains to depart from the station from 6:00am, those were delayed two hours due to the derailment.
The rail communication restored around 8:00am on a limited scale after the derailed bogies of the train were removed from the track, according to the Kamalapur station sources.
Passengers on different routes suffered a lot as most of the trains remained stranded at different stations, including at Airport, Cantonment Station, Tejgaon, Joydebpur, Pubail, Tongi and Ghorasal station. Sources at the
Kamalapur Railway Station said that the Chattogram bound Ghudhuli Express left the Kamalapur Station at 3:00pm. The train was supposed to leave the station at 7:45am.
Lalmonirhat bound Burimari Express, Rangpur Express, Panchagarh bound Ekota Express, Sylhet bound Parabat Express and Joyontika Express departed the Kamalapur Station with five to seven hours behind the schedule.
Other services, such as the Sonar Bangla (Chattogram), Egarosindhur Probhati (Kishoreganj), Teesta Express (Dewanganj), Mohua Commuter (Mohanganj), and Nilsagar Express (Chilahati), experienced delays of 3-5 hours.
Anowar Hossain, station master at Kamalapur, told the Bangladesh Post that three trains -- Kishoreganj-bound Kishoreganj Express, Panchagarh-bound Panchagarh Express and Tarakandi-bound Agnibina Express-- were canceled due to scheduling disruptions, leaving several thousand passengers stranded.
Hossain explained that four carriages of the Panchagarh Express derailed but did not overturn, and no injuries were reported.
The derailment occurred just two minutes after the train left the station, running approximately 30 minutes behind schedule.
Eyewitnesses reported track damage at the derailment site, though the train’s low speed likely prevented injuries.
Earlier Thursday morning, another derailment involving a Dhaka-Narayanganj local train at Gopibagh led to a five-and-a-half-hour suspension of train services on the Dhaka-Khulna route, further complicating the day’s train operations.
Bangladesh Railway has formed two separate probe bodies to investigate the incidents.
