60 buses remain off road three days after rain stopped

CHENNAI: The heavy rain that paralysed the city earlier this week literally drowned around 60 MTC buses, plying from areas such as Tambaram, Sholinganallur, KK Nagar, Anna Nagar and Madhavaram to various places, officials said.
A senior MTC official said water entered the engines through the exhaust as the buses struggled through inundated areas and they stalled.“The buses with defective engines have been brought to the workshop on Patullos Road off Anna Salai and repair work has been in full swing in the last three days. Almost 45 engines have been repaired and fitted on to the buses one by one,” he said.
The buses are still off the roads. Given the seriousness of the problem, the MTC top brass deployed additional technicians at the Patullos Road workshop where they work round the clock in shifts to clean the water-logged engines, he said.
The absence of so many buses affected services, particularly in areas where water receded on Thursday.
Direct services on the Kundrathur-Somangalam route could no resume till Friday. The discharge basin of the Chembarambakkam reservoir is located close to this stretch and the water flow in surrounding areas remains heavy. MTC services on the route are now operated via Tambaram, the official said.
About 10 MTC buses got stuck in various subways as the rain pounded the city. While nine were retrieved quickly, the one that was stranded in the Aranganathan subway, linking Saidapet with parts of West Mambalam and Ashok Nagar, remained there for a long time.
The bus had set out around 4am from the depot concerned to pick up drivers for the morning shift and the subway was relatively dry on the onward trip.