Serious SINGAPORE Going public on train cracks could have caused undue panic: Khaw

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SINGAPORE: Declaring that trains were being returned to China for repairs due to hairline cracks could have caused undue panic, Transport Minister Khaw Boon Wan said at the Bishan Depot on Tuesday (Jul 12).

Mr Khaw said that going public for something that was not "a major event" might have caused unnecessary panic to the layman, noting that to engineers, not all cracks are the same.

"If all cracks have to be reported, if they do not cause any of those issues on safety, they will have to think about what is the impact on the ground," said Mr Khaw. "Looking back, I think it's understandable."

He added that if there was a safety issue, the Land Transport Authority (LTA) would have gone public.

"If there is a safety issue and there's no response, what will that be like?" Mr Khaw asked. "LTA will decide to go public immediately."

The Transport Minister added that even if there were no safety concerns, should rectification works require many trains to be taken away, his ministry and LTA will still explain why they will have to reduce capacity of the rail system.

The briefing comes after Hong Kong-based news agency FactWire reported that the defective trains were being sent back to Qingdao, China, claiming that the recalls were being done "in secret". SMRT has said the trains on its rail lines are "extensively tested" to ensure safety and reliability.

HAIRLINE CRACKS NOT LINKED TO ANY TRAIN DELAYS: LTA

There was no correlation to train delays of more than five minutes to the hairline cracks, LTA said at the briefing. It indicated that most of the delays since 2014 were linked to signalling faults, door or brake issues, with none linked to hairline cracks.

The authority added that even when trains were being repaired, there were always enough trains to meet demand.

For example, for 2016, there are 140 trains available for the North-South and East-West lines, and 124 trains are needed to meet demand. This will continue till 2019 - when replacement work is completed - where there will always be more trains available than needed, according to estimates.

SAME CONSORTIUM WON NEW CONTRACT AS CRACK PROBLEM WAS RESOLVED

The Kawasaki / Sifang consortium also won Contract T251 - for the supply of 91 four-car electric multiple units trains for the Thomson East Coast Lines - because the problem of hairline cracks for trains purchased under contract C151A were resolved conclusively.

"From the experience of C151A, bolsters of trains will be supplied by Japanese supplier Kobe Steel," said LTA.

"Kawasaki / Sifang has shown a high level of responsiveness and strong sense of responsibility in addressing the issue," it added.

LTA said that the consortium won out of six bidders at it provided the best overall offer based on price, quality and life-cycle costs. Other bidders included Hyundai Rotem, which wanted to build the trains in Korea, and Construcciones Y Auxiliar De Ferrocarriles, which would have built the trains in Spain. Four other tenderers proposed to assemble the trains in China.


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