Activities of suspected vandals of railway tracks on the Lagos-Ibadan standard gauge line have continued to threaten smooth operations on the line.
Just on Monday, a Lagos-Ibadan train had to stop four times before getting to the destination following the vandalism of the tracks by unidentified criminals.
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Daily Trust learnt that clips were removed from some of the tracks prompting the locomotive driver to stop to check the extent of the damage.
The Regional District Manager of the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) in Lagos, Engr Augustine Arisa, in an interview with our correspondent, defended the action of the train driver, saying what he did was a standard safety protocol to check the length of the clips removed from the tracks.
According to him, it could be risky to continue the journey without checking the extent of damage done to the tracks.
He said, “You know, we have two tracks there. When a driver sees such things, he is bound to stop first; look at the length of the clips that were removed and now check whether it would be safe for him to continue on that line or something that he needs to propel back and change to another line.
“So those were the things he checked which were not out of place. If the length is so long that if it continues there is a possibility of an accident, he would propel back and take another line.
“So he had to check and find out first before he continued. So what he did was the normal thing. He checked the length the thing was removed, he saw that it was safe for him to continue and he continued.”
He, however, disclosed that the corporation has decided to outsmart the vandals by replacing the removed clips with those that cannot be easily removed.
“But on our own, what we are doing is that those places where they removed clips that were accessible to them, we are now changing to the ones that are not accessible to them; tamper-proof clips, which they cannot easily remove. That is what we were doing.
“As at yesterday, there were three stops where those clips were removed and he had to stop and check if it was safe for him to continue.
“What he did bordered on safety. Because he is carrying lives and he would not want to endanger the lives of the people he is carrying.”
Arisa also stated that the military and the police have intensified patrol on the line to arrest the suspected vandals.
