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Rail crash is a human tragedy and a disaster for Beijing
The crash of two Chinese bullet trains is, first and foremost, a human tragedy. The ordeal of Xiang Weiyi, a two-year-old girl who lay for 21 hours in the twisted wreckage near the corpses of her parents, has transfixed China’s public.
So has the story of Yang Feng, who lost his seven-month pregnant wife and three other relatives in the collision and has questioned the accuracy of the official death toll, at least 39, according to state media reports.
As families grieve and demand answers beyond the official explanation that lightning caused the crash, there are many in the railway industry who are quietly shaking their heads and whispering that they saw this coming.
Many rail experts have warned that China’s rush to build the world’s longest and fastest high speed rail network in record time was a recipe for disaster. As well as proving them tragically right, this crash ends Beijing’s ambitions to sell its nascent high-speed rail technology to the world, at least for the foreseeable future.
The crash came barely four years after China’s first high-speed trains began operating.
Compare that to Japan, where the bullet train network has not had any big accidents involving injuries or deaths since it started running in 1964, say Japanese officials. They were the ones who spoke out the loudest about safety concerns in China and the Chinese rail industry’s industrial scale copying of rail technology bought over the past decade from foreign companies such as Japan’s Kawasaki, Germany’s Siemens, France’s Alstom and Canada’s Bombardier.
The Chinese railway ministry and state-owned rail companies have repeatedly said China owns nearly all the intellectual property for its high-speed train technology, which it acquired through a process they describe as “technology importation, digestive absorption, independent reinnovation and localisation”.
But executives at foreign rail companies have long complained that trains meant to run at up to 200kph (124mph) have been copied, modified and then made to run at speeds for which they were never designed, potentially compromising their safety. Some of these executives told the Financial Times they refused to ride on China’s high-speed trains because of safety concerns.
Given the serious questions that hang over the provenance of China’s high-speed rail technology, it seems unlikely that any other country will risk the lives of its citizens on imported Chinese bullet trains, no matter how cheap they are.
The crash and the way it has been handled by Beijing have also raised wider questions about governance in China.
China’s railways minister was fired in February for “disciplinary violations” that apparently involved taking huge bribes but nobody expects that his dismissal has solved the problem of corruption at the ministry.
After Saturday’s crash, the authorities sacked three senior railway officials from the Shanghai Railway Bureau, including its head. But the Chinese public was outraged when the government named as his replacement An Lusheng, the railway ministry’s general chief of command and control.
It turns out that Mr An was demoted in connection with China’s last large train disaster, when two trains collided in April 2008 in Shandong province, killing 71 people. He was moved to a regional post, shuffled around different jobs and then restored to his old position within two years.
Further outrages include the sight of wrecked carriages being buried next to the track less than 24 hours after Saturday’s crash and a video online of what appear to be bodies falling out of those carriages.
Coming after scandals involving tainted Chinese products, the crash will tarnish the image of China Inc in the global marketplace.
But probably the bigger damage to perceptions will be done in China, where on Monday one citizen microblogger summed up the sentiment in a widely circulated posting: “Today’s China is a bullet train racing through a thunderstorm – and we are all passengers on board.”
7.23动车事故已经过去了5天，人民对在事故中伤亡者的悲痛之情，以及对事故后续处理不当的愤慨远没有离去，人民需要一个真相，需要一个交代。在事故原因还没公布之前，像出事车头埋掉，提前达成赔偿协议的受难者家属有奖励，这样的做法是不应该的，让人民寒心的。
选文揭示了中国公共治理问题，在表达对遇难者沉重哀悼的同时，我们不仅要沉思，怎样才能避免此类事件的发生。作为ZF机构,在公信力已经透支的情况下，该反省怎么做，怎样挽回人民对你的信任。中国经济在高速的发展，跑的快，可也要跑的稳。正如纽约时报引博客的话，China, please stop your flying pace, wait for your people, wait for your soul, wait for your conscience! Don't let the train out off track, don't let the briges collapse, don't let the roads become traps, don't let houses become ruins. Walk slowly,allowing every life to have freedom and dignity. No one should be left behind by our era.
我知道大家都在关注事故后续处理的进展，为受伤者祈福，遇难者祈祷。在这里，除了文章内容的英文评论外，您可以从各个角度，比如人文，经济发展，以及公共治理改革等方面发表自己的观点，关于铁老大过激的言论就不要了，我们知道论坛是学术性交流，鼓励百家争鸣。
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