Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp (THSRC) today said its trains were running normally after overnight work resolved a signaling problem that had forced trains to be canceled and rescheduled a day earlier.
At 11:30pm yesterday, maintenance workers gathered near the section of track in Miaoli where the switch signal abnormality had occurred, the company said in a statement.
Immediately after the last train passed, the workers began conducting repairs and were able to resolve the issue by 1:43am, the company said.
Photo: Wu Liang-yi, Taipei Times
At 3:30am, THSRC convened an emergency response meeting, led by company chairman Shih Che (史哲), and confirmed that the railway could return to its normal schedule today, it said.
THSRC said that it kept the components that had malfunctioned and planned to work with the manufacturer and third parties to determine what had caused the problem.
Based on initial assessments, the malfunction occurred in the power module of the switch machine control case, which is part of a three-year signaling system update project that is scheduled to be completed at the end of this year, the company said.
The railway again apologized for the inconvenience caused by the delays yesterday, adding that it would be distributing free snacks, bread and bottled water to passengers at all high-speed rail stations this morning.
The signaling problem forced the high-speed rail company to cancel all originally scheduled trains starting at 8am yesterday and instead dispatch three southbound trains per hour from Nangang Station and three northbound trains from Zuoying Station.
The trains departed on the hour, at 20 minutes past and at 40 minutes past, stopping at every station along the route, with only non-reserved seating being used, except in business-class cars.
The railway has said it is offering 50 percent or full refunds to travelers affected by the delays, depending on how late they arrived at their destination.
