The North-South railway line through Huế City reopens on Friday morning after three days of being cut off by floods.— Photo vietnamplus.vn

HUẾ — The North-South railway line running through the central city of Huế is reopened on Friday morning after being cut off for three days due to flooding that submerged and damaged sections of the track.

At 5am on Friday, Bình Trị Thiên Railway Joint Stock Company, under the Việt Nam Railways Corporation, announced that the line had been restored and trains were able to pass through Huế City again.

Services have resumed at a restricted speed of 5 km/h to ensure absolute safety for all trains operating in the area.

According to company representatives, floodwaters had receded below the track foundation by early morning.

Previously, multiple sections of the railway through Huế City had been undermined, with ballast swept away and railbeds destabilised by floodwaters.

Throughout Thursday night, hundreds of railway engineers and workers were mobilised to work overtime, reinforcing embankments, adding ballast and checking track stability to reopen the route as quickly as possible.

By Friday morning, the entire North-South railway line was essentially back in operation after three days of disruption, except for trains SE5/6 and SE9/10, which remain suspended due to earlier timetable adjustments.

During the period of interruption, the railway sector organised safe passenger transfers across flooded areas to maintain continuity of travel.

The disruption began at 4pm on Monday, when flooding reached 15-20cm above the track level through Huế City, forcing railway authorities to close the section.

At the same time, the Hương River rose dangerously close to the decks of Bạch Hổ and Dã Viên bridges, within just 10m.

To protect the structures, the company deployed two freight trains carrying a total of 1,150 tonnes of rock from Đồng Hới (Quảng Trị Province) and Hương Thủy (Huế City) to anchor the bridges and counter the risk of floodwaters washing them away.

When the river level dropped to 1.2m below the bridge deck at 10am on Wednesday, the company withdrew the two trains to Huế Station.

However, just eight hours later, as the river surged again to within 4 cm of the bridge deck, the trains were redeployed to stabilise the bridges overnight, before being withdrawn again on Thursday morning once conditions allowed for line restoration.— VNS