SMRT to pay lower fine of $2.4m for EWL disruption; must invest at least $600k to boost reliability

SINGAPORE – Rail operator SMRT will pay a lower fine of $2.4 million for a major six-day disruption on the East-West Line in September 2024, after it submitted representations to the Land Transport Authority (LTA).

This is down from

the financial penalty of $3 million

that LTA intended to hand out in June when the investigation findings into the incident were released.

Announcing the updated penalty in a statement on July 25, LTA said the penalty will go to the Public Transport Fund to help lower-income families with their public transport expenditures.

The authority added that it had directed SMRT to invest a minimum of $600,000 to strengthen its capabilities, and address areas for improvement from the incident, so as to improve service reliability.

“In reaching this decision, LTA took into consideration the considerable challenges SMRT had faced in planning and executing their overhaul regime for the Kawasaki Heavy Industries (KHI) trains, particularly in procuring the necessary spare parts for the overhaul due to global supply chain disruptions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.”

The incident, which involved a faulty part on a first-generation KHI train, downed MRT services between Jurong East and Buona Vista stations and affected about one in six train trips daily from Sept 25 to 30 in 2024.

An LTA spokesperson told The Straits Times that SMRT will need to channel $600,000 towards improving its capabilities within a year, and submit a declaration and documented proof of this.

In a Facebook post shortly after LTA’s statement, SMRT Trains president Lam Sheau Kai said the operator will strengthen its direct engagement with original equipment manufacturers of trains and systems. The operator will also deepen its technical and engineering expertise through closer collaboration with these companies.

On LTA’s directive to invest a minimum of $600,000 in beefing up its capabilities, Mr Lam said the development and upskilling of its workforce have long been SMRT’s priorities.

In addition, the operator will continue supporting the secondment of LTA engineers to SMRT – an initiative introduced in 2018.

It will also work closely with LTA and Alstom, the manufacturer of the new R151 trains, to roll out the fleet progressively.

By 2026, there will be 106 R151 trains on the North-South and East-West lines. As at June 29, 61 of these trains were in service. The last of the KHI trains will be phased out by September.

Investigations into the disruption showed that SMRT had extended the interval between overhauls for the faulty train

without a detailed engineering and risk assessment

.

On its part, the operator had flagged supply chain disruptions arising from the pandemic, which delayed the delivery of new trains meant to replace the first-generation models and spare parts needed for overhauls.

LTA had originally notified SMRT of its intention to impose the $3 million penalty on May 30, and gave the operator two weeks to submit its representations.

SMRT did so on June 6.

While the details of SMRT’s submission were not disclosed, representations may include reasons why the operator believes it should not be penalised as well as other applicable mitigating factors.

LTA reviewed SMRT’s representations before a notice of the penalty was sent to the rail operator on July 25.

SMRT has 14 days to appeal to the transport minister if it wishes. If that happens, the final decision lies with the minister, who can opt to reject the appeal, or allow it and change LTA’s decision.

Responding to ST’s query, Mr Lam did not say if SMRT would lodge an appeal with Acting Transport Minister Jeffrey Siow. But he said the company had received LTA’s notice to impose the penalty and noted that LTA had considered its representations.

LTA reiterated that Singapore’s rail system continues to be one of the most reliable worldwide.

Since 2019, the mean kilometres between failure of the MRT network has remained above the one million train-km target, it noted. This means MRT trains travelled for more than one million kilometres between delays of more than five minutes.

The revised $2.4 million penalty is the second-highest to be levied on a rail operator, after the $5.4 million fine that SMRT incurred over a 2015 disruption that crippled the entire North-South and East-West lines for more than two hours during the evening peak period.

In June, LTA said a $3 million penalty for the September 2024 disruption was “proportionate” to the circumstances surrounding the incident.

The authority said it also considered the cost that SMRT had borne from the repairs, and from providing free bus and shuttle train services at the affected stations.

Investigations pointed to degraded grease as the likely cause of the incident. This led to a faulty part of the train’s undercarriage falling out on the morning of Sept 25, 2024.

The part – an axle box, which holds the train’s wheels to the axle, a rod connecting a pair of wheels – was dislodged near Dover station while the train was being withdrawn from service to Ulu Pandan Depot.

This caused one of the train’s 12 bogies – a structure below the train carriage – to derail.

The six-carriage train could continue travelling, as the other 11 bogies remained on the rails. But the derailed portion of the third carriage caused extensive damage to 2.55km of track and trackside equipment, such as power cables and the third rail, which supplies power to trains.

Associate Professor Walter Theseira, a transport economist at the Singapore University of Social Sciences, told ST that in the context of rail operations, the $600,000 requirement for improvements is not a very significant amount. It could fund reviews and process improvements, but would not suffice for any substantial engineering work.

He also said new trains are “not a cure for reliability by themselves”, as they will result in better reliability only after teething issues have been sorted out.

Prof Theseira also believes LTA should examine its own capability to judge the quality of a maintenance regime.

“While the operator is on the ground and has first-hand knowledge, it may also be that the regulator should have a well-formed second opinion.”