Staff Reporter:
The Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) metro rail was not affected by the recent earthquake, as experts con-firmed that no physical displacement was detected.
“There was no physical displacement of the metro rail due to the recent earthquake,” said Md Faruk Ahmed, Managing Director of Dhaka Mass Transit Company Limited (DMTCL).
Addressing a press conference at the company’s conference room in Uttara yesterday, he said that the company’s utmost priority is passengers’ safety.
“If any incident occurs, we will first disconnect public services. We physically checked all the structures of the entire metro rail 4–5 hours after the earthquake,” he said.
Ahmed added, “I was also present. If anything happens, we normally carry out a test run before public service. That day, we ran two trains from both directions. Besides, we physically inspected the bearing pads at Farmgate and Bijoy Sarani areas. Due to this, our train service was delayed by 27 minutes.”
Replying to a question about social media, he said that following the earthquake, rumors circulated on social media claiming that the metro rail had collapsed.
The managing director said the authorities required some time to detect that those rumors were manufac-tured by Artificial Intelligence (AI).
He said that soon after the earthquake, authorities checked everything and revealed that there was no physical displacement in the metro rail.
