The Taiwan Railways Administration (TRA) yesterday said it would seek restitution from whoever painted graffiti on a EMU3000 train parked at its train depot in New Taipei City on Saturday night, adding that the vandal could face up to seven years in prison for disrupting railway operations.
It was the first time that a new train of the nation’s largest transportation agency has been vandalized with graffiti.
The train is one of 50 EMU3000 trains procured in 2019 to replace some of the TRA’s old intercity fleet. The procurement contract cost NT$44.29 billion (US$1.39 billion).
Photo courtesy of a reader
The EMU3000 train was also known as the “most beautiful of the Tzu-chiang trains.” The Tzu-chiang class is the TRA’s highest class of express passenger train.
The agency said it had reported the case to the Railway Police Bureau and would quickly restore the body of the train after police have gathered evidence.
The TRA would also seek compensation from those who vandalized the train to cover the costs of restoration, as well as financial losses sustained due to service disruptions, the agency said.
“As we were concerned that removing it by ourselves might damage the body paint, we have requested assistance from Hitachi, the manufacturer, in assessing the time and the money needed to clean and restore the exterior of the train, which would take two to three days to complete,” TRA rolling stock department director Cheng Kuo-hsi (鄭國璽) said.
However, the agency yesterday afternoon told reporters that the train resumed operation after workers had removed the graffiti by 2:20pm.
In addition to compensation, the vandals face fines of NT$1,500 to NT$7,500 for contravening the Railway Act (鐵路法) by defacing train coaches, Cheng said.
The Railway Police Bureau’s branch director for New Taipei City’s Shulin District (樹林), Su Chien-wei (蘇建偉), said that TRA workers discovered that the train had been vandalized at 4:50am yesterday and reported the incident to the police.
Under Article 68-2 of the act, those who jeopardize the normal operation of an important railway station, field, facility or equipment by stealing, destroying or other illegal means face imprisonment of one year to seven years, and could also be fined up to NT$10 million, Su said.
The entrance to the TRA’s train depot in Shulin was guarded around the clock, the bureau said, adding that it is investigating whether vandals entered the depot by hiding in the train after passing the terminal station.
Taiwan Railway Union chairman Wang Chieh (王傑) said that the agency should fine the vandals to deter more would-be graffiti artists from targeting trains.
Tropical Storm Usagi strengthened to a typhoon yesterday morning and remains on track to brush past southeastern Taiwan from tomorrow to Sunday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was approximately 950km east-southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost point, the CWA said. It is expected to enter the Bashi Channel and then turn north, moving into waters southeast of Taiwan, it said. The agency said it could issue a sea warning in the early hours of today and a land warning in the afternoon. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was moving at
DISCONTENT: The CCP finds positive content about the lives of the Chinese living in Taiwan threatening, as such video could upset people in China, an expert said Chinese spouses of Taiwanese who make videos about their lives in Taiwan have been facing online threats from people in China, a source said yesterday. Some young Chinese spouses of Taiwanese make videos about their lives in Taiwan, often speaking favorably about their living conditions in the nation compared with those in China, the source said. However, the videos have caught the attention of Chinese officials, causing the spouses to come under attack by Beijing’s cyberarmy, they said. “People have been messing with the YouTube channels of these Chinese spouses and have been harassing their family members back in China,”
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday said there are four weather systems in the western Pacific, with one likely to strengthen into a tropical storm and pose a threat to Taiwan. The nascent tropical storm would be named Usagi and would be the fourth storm in the western Pacific at the moment, along with Typhoon Yinxing and tropical storms Toraji and Manyi, the CWA said. It would be the first time that four tropical cyclones exist simultaneously in November, it added. Records from the meteorology agency showed that three tropical cyclones existed concurrently in January in 1968, 1991 and 1992.
UPDATED FORECAST: The warning covered areas of Pingtung County and Hengchun Peninsula, while a sea warning covering the southern Taiwan Strait was amended The Central Weather Administration (CWA) at 5:30pm yesterday issued a land warning for Typhoon Usagi as the storm approached Taiwan from the south after passing over the Philippines. As of 5pm, Usagi was 420km south-southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost tip, with an average radius of 150km, the CWA said. The land warning covered areas of Pingtung County and the Hengchun Peninsula (恆春), and came with an amended sea warning, updating a warning issued yesterday morning to cover the southern part of the Taiwan Strait. No local governments had announced any class or office closures as of press time last night. The typhoon
RSS