Japanese maker of train in deadly Taiwan crash finds design flaw (updated)

Nippon Sharyo

02/11/2018 02:48

(Adds Taiwan Rail comment, crash background, changes dateline)
    TOKYO/TAIPEI, Nov 2 (Reuters) - The Japanese manufacturer of
a train that derailed in Taiwan killing 18 people said it had
discovered a design flaw that failed to alert the central
control system that an automatic safety feature had been turned
off.
    On Oct. 21 a train in Yilan in Taiwan's northeast came off
the rails on a curve while travelling at almost 149 kmh (87
mph), nearly twice the speed limit, the head of a Taiwan
government investigation team has said.
    Eighteen people were killed and 187 injured in the island's
worst rail crash in decades.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL3N1X31T0
    Naoki Sato, an official at Nippon Sharyo, told Reuters on
Friday that the company's investigation into the crash had 
discovered a flaw in the blueprint for wiring the connection of
the train's automatic train protection (ATP) safety system to
the control station.
    There is no problem with the safety system itself, which is
designed to automatically apply the brakes when the train
exceeds the speed limit, the official said. 
    Nippon Sharyo's Sato said the flawed blueprint was used in
19 train sets built for Taiwan, including the one that crashed.
He said any decision on whether to fix the wiring was up to the
Taiwan rail authority, which owns the trains.
    The Taiwan Railways Administration said in a statement it
has asked Nippon Sharyo for a more detailed explanation. It did
not elaborate. It was not immediately clear whether the
remaining 18 trains were currently in operation.
    The train's driver, You Zhen-zhong, told a court last month
he switched off the speed-control system to boost the train's
power when it slowed down on an earlier stretch of the journey,
according to a Taiwan court spokesman, citing his bail hearing.
    The public defender for You said he knew he had to turn the
protection system back on but failed to do so because he was
busy communicating with other coordinators about a separate
problem with the train's speed.
    Shares in train manufacturer Nippon Sharyo Ltd  7102.T 
plunged by the daily limit in Tokyo, losing 17 percent to a
near-2-1/2-year low, after news of the design flaw.

 (Reporting by Chang-Ran Kim in TOKYO and Jessica Macy Yu in
TAIPEI; Editing by Michael Perry)
 ((ran.kim@thomsonreuters.com; +81-3-6441-1804; Reuters
Messaging: ran.kim.reuters.com@reuters.net))