Photo/Illutration An official with Tokyo Metro Co. explains how to operate platform screen doors during an inspection tour by transport minister Tetsuo Saito of its training facility in Tokyo’s Koto Ward on Nov. 13. (Masanori Isobe)

The traveling public is being urged to check where the emergency button on trains is located as soon as they board and to keep pressing it if an incident unfolds where passengers’ lives are at risk.

Transport minister Tetsuo Saito’s call follows indiscriminate attacks on passengers on moving trains this year that resulted in serious injuries.

The latest attack by a knife-wielding passenger on Keio Corp. train in Chofu, western Tokyo, on Oct. 31 left one passenger in a critical condition and 16 others injured. 

Saito issued his plea after an inspection tour of Tokyo Metro Co.’s training facility in the capital’s Koto Ward on Nov. 13.

Tokyo Metro officials explained the company’s safety measures to the minister, including where emergency stop buttons are located inside train cars and how to open platform screen doors manually. 

Saito said passengers should not hesitate to push the button to bring a train to an emergency stop if an extraordinary situation develops.

“Passengers should press the button even if somebody has already done so,” he said. “If the button is pushed multiple times, it will alert train staff to an emergency situation in an instant.”

Saito said that cooperation among the traveling public was vital to ensure the safety of the public transport system that is used by millions of people each day.

In the Oct. 31 attack, terrified passengers escaped through windows because the doors did not open after the train made an emergency stop at a station on the Keio Line.

The 24-year-old perpetrator told police he had wanted to kill as many people as possible and was inspired by a similar stabbing rampage that occurred in August on an Odakyu Line train.

He said he targeted a limited express train because “it stops at fewer stations.”

In the latest incident, Keio staff did not open the train and platform screen doors due to safety concerns that they were not aligned appropriately at the station. This was because the train stopped 2 meters short of its right position to align to the platform screen doors.

During Saito’s tour, the Tokyo Metro facility reconstructed the nightmare situation using a mock subway station and subway cars to ascertain how passengers could safely evacuate under such circumstances.

“I was under the impression that passengers could get off a train relatively safely if the platform screen doors are open,” Saito said.

But he realized that things could be more complicated after he heard the explanation from Keio staff of their decision not to open the train doors right after the train stopped at a station.

“When to open the platform screen doors was a tough call in the Keio train case as some passengers landed on their feet on the top of the platform screen doors while they were trying to flee (through the windows of) the train,” Saito said. “If the platform screen doors had opened immediately, they might have ended up being injured by falling.”

Related News