HONG KONG – Some 48 hours after two subway trains collided during the test of a new signalling system in Hong Kong, train services on the affected line have resumed, the metro network operator said early on Wednesday morning (March 20).

A committee – which includes Thales, the French supplier of the system – has also been set up to investigate the accident.

MTR Corporation said shortly before 5am that the damaged trains have been removed from the accident site underground.

It added that repair work around Central station on the Tsuen Wan line is complete and thanked commuters for their understanding during this time.

Meantime, outgoing MTR chairman Frederick Ma said during an inspection of the platform that a committee has been set up. He vowed that the team will “conduct a thorough investigation” and “put safety above all else” before rolling out the system.

It would take the committee two to three months to study the data of the train collision, but Thales will hand in a preliminary report this week.

Monday’s collision was the first such accident in 40 years of MTR operations. The rail operator had said that the signalling fault stemmed from a software glitch.

Thales, in a joint venture with another French company Alstom, was awarded a €330 million (S$506 million) contract in 2015 to upgrade MTR’s signalling system.

The new system was to be rolled out in the later half of this year. But the upgrade is now expected to be delayed.

The collision happened in the wee hours of Monday during the trial run, which was carried out while the network was closed to the public.

Public confidence in Hong Kong’s usually trusty rail operator has been shaken after the accident.

Chief Executive Carrie Lam has assured the public that the government would not rush to roll out the new signalling system until it is proven safe.

The safety of the Thales system has come under scrutiny, as it was also linked to a train collision in Singapore in 2017 – even though both Thales and the Singapore authorities have said that the two accidents were different.

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