Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train project: The has launched one of the heaviest girder on the country’s first . The 508-km-long bullet train project stretches from Mumbai to Ahmedabad. The project is passing through Gujarat, Maharashtra and Union Territory of Dadra & Nagar Haveli.
According to , one of the heaviest precast-prestressed portal beam (girders), weighing around 1,360 metric tonnes (MT), has been launched over the Amdavad-Vadodara railway line in Maninagar, Gujarat. This beam is a precast concrete structure measuring 34 metres in length, with a cross-section of 5.5 metres by 4.5 metres.
The NHSRCL has planned to install five such beams near Maninagar railway station. These beams are being precast at site and erected as heavy integrated units, it said.
The entire launching activity was completed in a record short duration of about 3.5 hours, during a full traffic and power block coordinated with Indian Railways. Earlier, the same operation was planned with long-duration caution orders extending up to six months and requiring blocks of nearly 9 hours.
“Through meticulous planning and optimization, the execution time was significantly reduced to just 3.5 hours for both lines of the Amdavad–Vadodara section,” the NHSRCL said.
In a statement, NHSRCL said the lifting operation was carried out using a 2,200 MT crawler crane as the primary equipment, supported by auxiliary machinery such as a 260-ton standby crane, an 80-ton crane, man lifters and a lifter beam system with anchoring frames. It further said that the lifting arrangement utilized prestressed macalloy bars of 75 mm diameter, along with lifting beams and heavy-duty slings to safely handle the massive load.
“The operation presents several engineering challenges, including handling an ultra-heavy lift of around 1360 MT—one of the heaviest lifts executed over Indian Railways infrastructure along with the necessity to complete the entire erection within a short time window,” it added.
