On Wednesday last week, a Taichung MRT train crashed into a crane boom that fell onto the tracks, leaving one person dead and 10 injured. Many initially thought it was negligence on the part of the construction company that led to the fatal accident, leading Taichung Mass Rapid Transit Corp to conduct a series of inspections of construction sites along its MRT tracks.
Further investigation has revealed that the operation control center received 16 automatic warning signals about power system abnormalities in the six seconds after the boom fell onto the tracks, but the employees did not identify the problem in time.
The incident shows that the warning system has major flaws.
Taichung Mass Rapid Transit Corp needs to address the issue of signal ambiguity. As there have previously been a fair share of “sudden” power outages or shortages, MRT employees have developed the knee-jerk reaction of attributing the cause to power shortage and overlooking other possibilities. In this case, as the warning signal only said “power anomaly” instead of a more specific description, such as “unknown object on the track,” employees were misled into treating it as another power outage.
The warning system needs to be improved to avoid employees making the wrong decision or delaying notification.
Furthermore, even though various reasons and factors could all contribute to a power anomaly, the MRT employees, in this case, misjudged the situation due to their experiences dealing with power shortages. As most of the previous incidents were power-related and only needed minor troubleshooting, they were lulled into a false sense of security, resulting in a major error of judgement. If the employees had been given more specific or precise warning signals in the first place, they might not have made such a mistake.
Neither did the warning system provide specific anomaly information. While it is equipped with the preliminary function of detecting anomalies on the tracks, it can only show “power anomaly” for all anomalies. Under such circumstances, it would be challenging for employees to make the right judgement given such little information.
One possible improvement would be to link the warning system to the braking system. If the technical level-up cannot be achieved within a short period, the company may have to resort to other supplementary measures so that on-site workers can receive accurate information in time for informed decisionmaking.
There were a series of causes that culminated in the accident, including the construction company’s negligence governing on-site security, a flawed warning system, a faulty power supply system and a lack of on-the-job and scenario-based training. As a result, it is unfair for on-site employees to shoulder all the blame.
In the wake of the incident, the Taichung MRT has proposed three changes to its protocols, together with the introduction of two potential hardware updates.
The first is to enhance and standardize its emergency alert hand signals. The second is to encourage passengers who witness an accident to prevent the doors from closing, which would stop the train from leaving the station. The third would seek to ensure that Taichung MRT employees on trains can readily access their tool bags so it would be easier to stop the train.
As the investigation into the causes of the accident proceeds, we should also remember to take into account other causes that contributed to the accident in the hopes of preventing future tragedies.
Yang Yung-nane is a political science professor at National Cheng Kung University and a member of the board of directors of Transparency International Chinese Taipei.
Translated by Rita Wang
In their recent op-ed “Trump Should Rein In Taiwan” in Foreign Policy magazine, Christopher Chivvis and Stephen Wertheim argued that the US should pressure President William Lai (賴清德) to “tone it down” to de-escalate tensions in the Taiwan Strait — as if Taiwan’s words are more of a threat to peace than Beijing’s actions. It is an old argument dressed up in new concern: that Washington must rein in Taipei to avoid war. However, this narrative gets it backward. Taiwan is not the problem; China is. Calls for a so-called “grand bargain” with Beijing — where the US pressures Taiwan into concessions
The term “assassin’s mace” originates from Chinese folklore, describing a concealed weapon used by a weaker hero to defeat a stronger adversary with an unexpected strike. In more general military parlance, the concept refers to an asymmetric capability that targets a critical vulnerability of an adversary. China has found its modern equivalent of the assassin’s mace with its high-altitude electromagnetic pulse (HEMP) weapons, which are nuclear warheads detonated at a high altitude, emitting intense electromagnetic radiation capable of disabling and destroying electronics. An assassin’s mace weapon possesses two essential characteristics: strategic surprise and the ability to neutralize a core dependency.
Chinese President and Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Chairman Xi Jinping (習近平) said in a politburo speech late last month that his party must protect the “bottom line” to prevent systemic threats. The tone of his address was grave, revealing deep anxieties about China’s current state of affairs. Essentially, what he worries most about is systemic threats to China’s normal development as a country. The US-China trade war has turned white hot: China’s export orders have plummeted, Chinese firms and enterprises are shutting up shop, and local debt risks are mounting daily, causing China’s economy to flag externally and hemorrhage internally. China’s
During the “426 rally” organized by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party under the slogan “fight green communism, resist dictatorship,” leaders from the two opposition parties framed it as a battle against an allegedly authoritarian administration led by President William Lai (賴清德). While criticism of the government can be a healthy expression of a vibrant, pluralistic society, and protests are quite common in Taiwan, the discourse of the 426 rally nonetheless betrayed troubling signs of collective amnesia. Specifically, the KMT, which imposed 38 years of martial law in Taiwan from 1949 to 1987, has never fully faced its
RSS