Deoghar Ropeway Mishap | A Month Before Incident, Audit Warned About Ropes: Report

The audit report had recommended that the ropes should be clean and free from corrosion.

The Ministry of Home Affairs on Tuesday issued an advisory to all the state governments to carry out a safety audit of each ropeway project. | Photo: PTI

New Delhi: Three weeks before the ropeway mishap, that happened on Trikut Hills in Jharnkhand’s Deoghar district on Sunday, a government-backed agency had conducted a safety audit of the 1,770 metre long steel rope to haul the cable cars and had found its condition to be “satisfactory”, reported the Indian Express on Wednesday. 

The audit report had highlighted “24 local flaws/initiation of flaws” adding that a “close visual watch be kept on the rope and its joints or the splicing portions” read the IE report.  “But crucially, it emphasised that the probe “does not include” the aspect of “fatigue” that may have developed over time on the haulage rope, which was installed in 2014,” it stated further.

The audit report had recommended that the ropes should be clean and free from corrosion. “Special attention may be given…as the rope is more than seven years old. If any abnormality is noticed, rope may be replaced immediately,” the publication reported quoting the audit report. 

The report, titled ‘Evaluation and advice on the present condition of haulage rope of detachable grip monocable passenger ropeway of Trikut Pahar, Deoghar Jharkhand’, was prepared by Dhanbad-based Central Institute of Mining and Fuel Research (CIMFR), which functions under Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), mentioned the above stated Express report. 

“The 24 flaws which were found remained insignificant. I would have flagged problems in the ropeway if we had found any. It seems the problem was with the structures surrounding the rope. But the safety test we conducted included only the steel rope of the ropeway,” said D Basak, chief scientist and project coordinator, Wire Rope and Electrical Engineering, CIMFR who presented the audit report, quoted by the Indian Express.

35 people were rescued from cable cars that were stuck mid-air by a joint team of the Indian Army, Indian Air Force, National Disaster Response Force, and Indo Tibetan Border Police, while three people died during the rescue operation. 

Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren had announced Rs 5 lakh for the families of deceased state-sponsored treatment for all the injured. He also ordered registration of an FIR in the case. 

The Ministry of Home Affairs on Tuesday issued an advisory to all the state governments to carry out a safety audit of each ropeway project.