Talgo beats Rajdhani, completes final trial run in 12 hours

MUMBAI: Giving a boost to the Indian Railways’ plan to reduce journey time between national capital Delhi and financial capital Mumbai, Spanish made Talgo train

MUMBAI: Giving a boost to the Indian Railways’ plan to reduce journey time between national capital Delhi and financial capital Mumbai, Spanish made Talgo train has successfully completed its speed trial in less than 12 hours, which is four hours less than the fastest Rajdhani Express.

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The Talgo train covered 1,389 km Delhi-Mumbai distance in 11 hours and 48 minutes, at the speed of 150 kmph, said Ravinder Bhakar, chief public relations officer of Western Railway (WR). “Rajdhani Express, which is the fastest train on the route, takes around 16 hours on the same distance,” he said.

The train arrived at Mumbai Central late Saturday night at 2.33am, sources said. After departing from New Delhi at 2.45pm a day before, the scheduled arrival at Mumbai Central was 2.23am but despite a delay of 10 minutes, railway authorities consider it a big achievement.

“It is a major achievement for our team. We are working on increasing speed, reducing travel time using innovative means #Talgo,” tweeted railway minister Suresh Prabhu, while Railway ministry tweeted, “In a big boost to IR dreams of semi-high #Talgo’s train completed #Delhi#Mumbai Rajdhani route trial in <12Hrs.”

A senior railway official said now the result of the trials will be submitted to the Railway ministry that will decide if they want to introduce the train on the route. The ministry is likely to call global tenders for procurement of the trains, in which Talgo and other companies are expected to participate.

Talgo’s actual speed trials on Delhi-Mumbai section had begun from August 1 and total six speed trials were held. Of those four trials were conducted at the speed of 130kmph, two at 140 kmph and last one at 150kmph. Time taken during these trials varied from 16.41 hours to 11.48 hours.