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TRA apologizes to 6,000 travelers it delayed yesterday

The Taiwan Railway Admini-stration (TRA) apologized to approximately 6,000 passengers yesterday as commuter trains operating between Taipei and Songshan (松山) early yesterday morning were delayed because of continued problems with the signal system.

The inactive system caused the operation of 49 trains to be delayed or canceled, said TRA secretary-general Chang Ying-huei (張應輝).

Chang said a preliminary investigation had shown that the route between Taipei and Song-shan experienced a power failure at 2:30am.

Although the back-up battery was immediately activated as expected in such a situation, staff working the night shift were not aware that a power failure had occurred.

The back-up battery eventually ran out of power after having operated for four hours.

When the power supply from Taiwan Power was finally resumed, the signal system remained inactive.

The administration decided to dispatch trains using manual operations.

To avoid any collisions, the interval between commuter trains had to be expanded.

On average, each commuter train was delayed for 44 minutes because of the inactive signal system.

Operation of commuter trains did not resume its normal pace until 8:45am.

Following the incident, TRA announced that it plans to adjust the design of the power supply system to prevent a repeat of yesterday's delays or similar malfunctions.

A total of 168 passengers received a full refund for their tickets because their trains had been delayed for over an hour.

The refunds cost the company approximately NT$100,000 (US$3,125).

The TRA director general ordered a thorough investigation into the incident's cause and how to prevent similar disruptions and delays.
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