The crane truck that caused last week’s fatal train accident had slid onto the tracks about one-and-a-half minutes before it was struck, the Taiwan Transportation Safety Board said yesterday.
The board had launched an investigation into the derailment, which killed 50 people and injured 211 people, making it the nation’s most devastating railway accident in decades.
Carrying 494 passengers and four Taiwan Railways Administration personnel, the southbound express train to Taitung hit the truck as it was about to enter the Cingshuei Tunnel (清水隧道) in Hualien’s Sioulin Township (秀林).
Photo: CNA
The train derailed following the collision, with the left side of the eighth carriage completely destroyed. The seventh carriage was severely deformed and detached from the sixth carriage, the board said.
The fourth, fifth and sixth carriages were twisted as well, it said.
Board investigators tried to reconstruct the accident from data retrieved from the train’s dashcam, an onboard automatic train protection system, train control management system, a vehicle data recorder (VDR) on the crane truck, and footage from surveillance cameras along a nearby highway and other data, board chairman Young Hong-tsu (楊宏智) said.
The crane truck entered the construction site at 8:49am on Friday, carrying a load of used tires, an investigation report said.
VDR data showed that there were other vehicles operating on site, including excavators and motorcycles, the board’s Rail Occurrence Investigation Division convener Li Gang (李綱) said.
The Taiwan Railways Administration said that it had informed contractors that they had to stop all construction work during the Tomb Sweeping Day long weekend.
The board also traced the movement of the crane truck from the VDR data, which showed that it slid down from the top of a slope and was stuck in the bushes when it hit a curve.
The VDR on the truck stopped recording after the truck’s engine was turned off, Li said.
“Based on footage from surveillance cameras and our on-site observation, we infer that the truck fell downhill through a treeless patch on the side of the slope after the engine was turned off and fell on the railroad, with the front of the truck facing the Heren Tunnel (和仁隧道), from which the Taroko Express emerged. A head-on collision ensued about one-and-a-half minutes after the truck flipped over onto the tracks,” Young said.
Asked if the driver left the truck after the engine was turned off, Young said that such information would be disclosed at the discretion of prosecutors.
Dashcam footage from the train showed that the driver could see the truck when the train emerged from the Heren Tunnel.
The train was traveling at 125kph, which means it would have needed 500m to 600m to come to a full stop.
The truck was about 240m from the Heren Tunnel, Young said.
Data from the train control management system showed the train driver and his assistant trying to stop the train by applying the brakes, but they only managed to slow it to 121kph.
The board found that the truck’s brake system was modified as well, Li said.
The board has disclosed about 70 to 80 percent of the evidence gathered on site during the holiday, Young said, adding that it would publish a complete report within four months.
A signaling system malfunction disrupted high-speed rail (HSR) services beginning at 8am today, with trains temporarily reduced to three northbound and three southbound trains per hour as authorities conduct inspections. The malfunction occurred on a section of track in Miaoli County during pre-operation checks early this morning, forcing northbound and southbound trains to use a single track, the HSR operator said. The regular schedule has been replaced with three hourly trains offering only nonreserved seating in each direction, stopping at every station, it said, adding that business class cars would still have reserved seating. Departures from terminal stations are scheduled at the top
DRONE CENTRAL: Taiwan aims to become Asia’s democratic hub for drones, with most exports focused on high-quality military-grade models, an official said Taiwan’s drone industry is expected to expand significantly by 2030, producing 100,000 units per month and exporting half of them, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Current drone production capacity is about 15,000 units per month, but the industry can quickly scale up as demand increases, Industrial Development Administration Director-General Chiou Chyou-huey (邱求慧) told a news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s drone output grew 2.5-fold last year to NT$12.9 billion (US$408.3 million) under a government program to develop the uncrewed vehicle sector, he said. The Executive Yuan in October last year approved plans to invest NT$44.2 billion into domestic production of uncrewed aerial
VERBOSE VESSELS: A CGA cutter and a China Coast Guard exchanged verbal barbs for more than a day in Taiwanese-controlled waters before the Chinese vessel left The Taiwanese and Chinese coast guards had a standoff near the strategically located Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the north of the South China Sea, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said yesterday. The two sides engaged in intense radio exchanges over sovereignty claims during the 33-hour standoff. China Coast Guard vessel 3501 eventually left the restricted waters, 26.6 nautical miles (49.2km) west of the Pratas Islands, at 5pm yesterday, the CGA said. Lying approximately between southern Taiwan and Hong Kong, the Taiwan-controlled Pratas are seen by some security experts as vulnerable to Chinese attack due to their distance — more than
WARNING: China should stop engaging in actions that undermine regional peace and stability, as it would only build resentment among people across the Strait, the CGA said China has deployed more than 100 navy, coast guard and other vessels in waters from the Yellow Sea to the South China Sea and the western Pacific since US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) met in Beijing, National Security Council Secretary-General Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said yesterday. “In this part of the world, #China is the one & only PROBLEM wrecking the #StatusQuo & threatening regional peace & stability,” Wu wrote on X. In a separate post, he said Beijing was coercing Taiwan’s maritime domain, calling it illegal and provocative, after the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) expelled a
RSS