Photo/Illutration Passengers wait in line at a ticket office at Tokyo Station on July 22 as service was disrupted on the Tokaido Shinkansen Line. (Takeshi Komiya)

Travelers were forced to improvise and find alternate ways to their destinations as the Tokaido Shinkansen Line was partially suspended on July 22, stranding an estimated 250,000 passengers during the summer vacation season. 

A total of 328 runs were halted on the bullet train line, which connects Tokyo and Shin-Osaka stations, as a collision of two rail maintenance vehicles rendered the section of track between Nagoya and Hamamatsu in Shizuoka Prefecture impassable. 

A 42-year-old man who came from Dubai with three family members left Kyoto Station around noon, changed to a bullet train on the Hokuriku Shinkansen Line at Tsuruga Station in Fukui Prefecture and arrived at Tokyo Station past 5 p.m.

“It was a long journey,” the man said.

For many travelers like him, the Hokuriku Shinkansen Line, which links Tokyo and Tsuruga, offered a precious lifeline.

A 65-year-old man was at Tsuruga Station on his way back home to Tokyo after canceling part of his family trip in Kobe.

While it would take four hours if he rode a bullet train from Shin-Kobe to Tokyo, the detour via the Hokuriku Shinkansen Line would require eight to nine hours, the man said.

“Still, I’m glad I’ll probably manage to get home by the end of the day,” he said.

While West Japan Railway Co. added two relief runs both ways to help meet the emergency demand, many trains on the Hokuriku Shinkansen Line were jam-packed.

“Non-reserved seats were fully occupied, and I was standing all the way,” a woman said.

Many photographs showing passengers standing in aisles and outside the seating areas were posted on social media.

With the track between Hamamatsu and Nagoya out of commission, trains between Tokyo and Hamamatsu and between Nagoya and Shin-Osaka were also severely restricted.

Only two Kodama bullet trains, which stop at every station, ran those routes in both directions each hour.

Central Japan Railway Co. (JR Tokai) said that two runs an hour were the maximum possible, since the trains needed to switch directions for their return trips at Nagoya and Hamamatsu stations, which are not equipped with facilities for such shuttle runs.

The company said that the trains stopped at all stations to accommodate as many passengers as possible.

The accident occurred in Gamagori, Aichi Prefecture, during rail maintenance work, which is conducted between midnight and 6 a.m., outside operating hours.

Two maintenance vehicles collided around 3:37 a.m. on July 22 when the brakes failed on a vehicle that was transporting rail track ballast on a slope, causing it to rear-end the other ballast-tamping vehicle.

The transport vehicle was running at about 40 kph. Its driver and another worker were injured.

Both vehicles were derailed by the collision. They became unable to move on their own even after they were returned onto the tracks.

It took until a little past 10 p.m. to remove the vehicles from the accident site by towing them on wheeled platforms to a maintenance depot.

Some railroad ties had to be replaced and oil had spilled at the site.

Related News