Monkey Business: Tanzania blames baboons as electric train gets stuck in the wilderness at Midnight

The recently launched Standard Gauge Electric Train was stuck deep in the night and in the middle in the wilderness, with stranded passengers, when the power supply got cut off.

But a statement from The Tanzania Railways Corporation (TRC) has caused mirth and jokes on social media platforms as the authorities seem to be blaming monkeys and owls for the train failure.

The TRC through its spokesperson, Jamila Mbarouk, issued an official apology to passengers following the more than two hours of delay of its Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) train, which got stuck somewhere as it was traveling from Dar es Salaam to Dodoma, on July 30.

Apparently the fault occurred in a remote area between Kilosa and Kidete stations of Morogoro during dark hours causing panic among the travellers on board.

It did not help much when the Railways management suggested that the problem, or outage, was likely caused by wild animals, especially monkeys and night flying owls swinging on the wires at night.

What TRC tried to suggest is that Monkeys, baboons and owls or any other night prowling monster could have come into contact with the overhead catenary system that sends power into the locomotive mills.

U.S Pop star, Lionel Richie once sang about a ‘Night Train,’ and ‘Smooth Alligator,’ and the lyrics sounded silly then, except A night Tanzanian train recently got affected by Baboons.

Anyway, whichever the cause, the disruption led to a power outage at Godegode Substation No. 7 at around 10:20 pm or so.

Night Train and Smooth Monkeys

But if Owls were among the culprits that did the damage, then chances are they were a strange kind, because these types of flying mammals though usually active during the night, are not common in the area.

Further reports say technicians working on the lines managed to resolve the issue and restore power by 00:30 hours of the Midnight, allowing the train to resume its journey to Dodoma in the wee hours of July 31, 2024.

But Monkey and Owls aside, Tanzania continue to experience series of power shortages affecting most parts of the country due to an extremely inefficient but monopoly enjoying, state-run, national electric supply company (TANESCO).

Observers believe that if the SGR train continues to rely on electricity supplied by TANESCO then its performance stands to be drastically affected in a negative way.