MRT breakdown: Instant tweets, posts play key role

Speed of news spread by commuters online a contrast to SMRT's 'silence'

Published on Dec 17, 2011

A photo of passengers on a train that stalled between City Hall and Dhoby Ghaut stations on Thursday evening, taken by bank manager Chen Ying Kai, 29, who was stranded in the train. -- PHOTO: CHEN YING KAI

By Ng Kai Ling & Poon Chian Hui

It may not have been a national disaster, but experts say the massive online buzz generated by Thursday night's MRT train breakdown shows the key role social media will play in such a scenario.

This underlines how important it is for government and corporate organisations to establish a presence on platforms like Twitter and Facebook, they added.

In fact, two of the pictures that have come to define the crisis - one of a smashed train door window and another of a message sent out by SMRT to its taxi drivers of an 'income opportunity' created by the breakdown - were sourced from Twitter.

And Transport Minister Lui Tuck Yew's first comments on the breakdown were delivered not through an official press statement, but via a Facebook posting.

Media and crisis management experts said Thursday's episode illustrated how much faster news travels now - through the sharing and re-posting of information on the Internet - compared with five years ago.

By the time SMRT finally made an official announcement at 9.15pm, thousands of tweets and re-tweets of the incident on Twitter already made SMRT one of the top trending Singapore topics.

Those who whipped out their phones to capture last night's scenes said they wanted little more than to keep their friends informed.

Junior college student Jonathan Liem, whose journey from Braddell to City Hall ground to a halt at Orchard station, posted this on his Facebook page: 'No train service for whole of north south line. So a warning to you all.'

He also sent four pictures to citizen journalism website Stomp.

The lack of information from SMRT, standing in contrast to real-time updates from such commuters, would only fan frustrations further, said Dr Michael Netzley, assistant professor of corporate communications at the Singapore Management University.

'If you have complete silence for more than two hours, effectively you are letting the frustrated commuters speak on your behalf,' he said. 'All we saw was the unhappiness and the lack of response.'

Mr Yap Boh Tiong, managing director of Mileage Communications, said that the sheer speed at which information is disseminated through social media poses a huge challenge to companies because they have much less time to react.

'Now the public has full knowledge of everything the moment it happens and they expect an immediate response,' he said.

Mileage previously handled high-profile cases such as the Slim 10 saga and food poisoning at the International Sports School.

Media experts said SMRT could have done themselves a favour by at least acknowledging that there was a breakdown before putting out an official statement.

Dr Netzley said: 'A simple public acknowledgement and apology of the problem reported in the media could have gone a long way in helping the company's image.'

A Straits Times check on Friday revealed that several new Facebook pages had already sprung up, filled with postings from netizens that pilloried SMRT for the breakdown. There was also a Twitter channel named 'SMRTRuinsLives'.

Assistant Professor Augustine Pang from Nanyang Technological University's Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information also suggested there is a need for SMRT to relook whether all their communication procedures - not just those for online platforms - are sufficient.

Other simple measures such as for staff on-site to wear a bright vest to stand out from the crowd could also help calm frayed tempers, said experts. This is so that commuters know they can go to them for help.

'Online platforms are useful, but in such crises, people want to see a face, someone to reassure and explain the situation to them,' said Prof Pang, who is from the division of public and promotional communication.

kailing@sph.com.sg

chpoon@sph.com.sg