Problems on First Day of KTX

The high-speed train KTX broke down at Daejon Station and East Daegu Station on its first day, causing the passengers the inconvenience of transferring to a different train.

At approximately 10:20 a.m. on April 1, KTX 46, headed to Seoul from Busan, had to stop at Daejon Station due to a hitch in its electricity supply. A faulty electricity supply device blocked electricity from the supplementary power supply, causing the lights to go off in several coaches.

Due to this mishap, out of the original 100 passengers, 70 of them, whose final destination was not Daejon, had to get on a different train. As a result, one train scheduled to leave Daejon Station at 10:24 a.m. was delayed for about 20 minutes.

Mr. Yang (45) who boarded the train in Busan said, “I felt anxious because the train, which had been running at 300km per hour, suddenly slowed to 180km per hour.”

KTX 50, headed from Busan to Seoul, stopped at East Daegu Station at 11:35 a.m. due to a defect in its wheel protection device. The device prevents oil or other materials from getting on the wheel so that it does not malfunction. An operator of the train explained, “I perceived something to be wrong with the device when I saw the sensor flashing a little after we passed Busanjin Station. However we continued on to East Daegu Station because it did not impede operations.”

The Korean National Railroad is closely examining these two trains at the KTX inspection complex in Goyang City, Gyeonggi Province.

mhjee@donga.com