Railway accident in Taiwan
On 10 May 2023, a construction crane fell 30 floors from a construction site of Highwealth Construction Corp onto a moving Taichung Metro Green Line train south of Feng-le Park metro station, Taichung, Taiwan, killing 1 and injuring 10 passengers onboard.
The deceased passenger, legal scholar Lin Shu-ya, 52, was ejected out of the train carriage upon impact, resulting in her being crushed under the same train.
One passenger onboard, a Canadian national, claimed that the driverless train was stationary when the crane fell onto the tracks and the train then proceeded to drive and collide straight onto the fallen crane.
Investigation.
It was revealed that the onboard train attendant followed company procedures to contact the control center about the crane obstructing the track. However, the control center at Taichung Metro would require 20 seconds to activate the emergency brakes remotely, which was insufficient to prevent the collision. The passenger emergency buttons onboard the train were not designed to immediately stop the train.
The Taichung District Prosecutors Office questioned Taichung Metro staff involved in the incident and ten Highwealth Construction Corp personnel who were responsible for the operation of the construction crane.
The operations control center detected a loss of power caused by the fallen crane, but power was automatically restored shortly after. Half of the control center staff were on meal break at time of the incident.
Timeline of incident.
At a press conference, Taichung Metro revealed that based on CCTV footage of the train and the station before the fallen crane, the following events occurred:
Reactions.
Taichung Metro said they intended to seek at least TWD 0.2 billion (USD6.5 million) in compensation against Highwealth Construction Corp for damage and losses resulting from the collapse.
Other metro operators in Taiwan began to review and secure ongoing construction sites that were situated near the tracks.
Taipei Metro admitted that the existing procedures regarding driverless trains, such as the Wenhu Line, were inadequate to stop the train in time under a similar scenario as the track circuit would not be broken and detect a fallen crane, and staff opening the manual driving panel or informing the control centre to cut off power would have taken too long. Taipei Metro promised to develop new procedures to deal with such scenarios, and in the meantime metro staff were authorized to deliberately obstruct the platform or train doors from closing in order to prevent the train from moving off.
The acting chairman of Taichung Metro resigned after he was criticized for his performance post-collapse.
Taichung Metro proposed changes to procedures to prevent collapse of a similar nature. Changes in protocol included introducing a new standardized hand signal for staff indicating emergency stop is necessary, encouraging staff and passengers to prevent the doors from closing by obstructing the doors to prevent a driverless train from departing after witnessing an incident, and relocating the key to a separate, more accessible holder to allow roving staff to more easily open the manual driving panel to access the emergency stop button. Taichung Metro also promised updates to emergency devices at stations and obstruction detection devices that will allow a train to stop in time or prevent its departure in similar circumstances.
The Taiwan Transportation Safety Board concluded in June 2024 that the primary reasons for the collapse were a failure to ensure proper operation of a tower crane and a lack of clear measures for restricting or prohibiting construction on either side of Taichung Metro tracks. In August 2024, two workers were indicted on charges of negligent manslaughter.
References.
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