Hyderabad, May 9 (IANS): The South Central Railway's Oxygen Express started on Sunday, on its third run to bring much needed oxygen from Odisha, for the Covid-hit people of Telangana.

Departing from the Sanathnagar New Goods Complex here, the Oxygen Express carrying 5 empty tankers is proceeding to Tata Steel at Angul in Odisha, where the empty tankers will be filled with Liquid Medical Oxygen.

The SCR Oxygen Express is an initiative taken up at the request of the Telangana government. Indian Railways began operating Oxygen Express trains on a mission mode to meet the oxygen requirement in different parts of the country.

Under this initiative, tankers filled with Liquid Oxygen are being transported by Railways through Ro-Ro or Roll on - Roll Off service. In this way, the transportation of these tankers can be achieved with minimum enroute detention.

SCR has earlier moved two empty Oxygen Expresses to Angul and now the third one is on its way to Odisha.

While, the first rake having 5 tankers with 63.6 tonnes of LMO was received on May 2, the second rake having 4 tankers with 60.23 tonnes LMO was received on May 4. Considering its importance, both the rakes were transported within a short duration of 32 hours from the loading point to the destination station of Sanath Nagar in Hyderabad, traversing a distance of over 1,300 km.

Gajanan Mallya, general manager, SCR, said that utmost priority is being given to run these trains and continuously monitor the movement of Oxygen Express over the Zone.