SINGAPORE - Normal service on the East-West Line resumed at 11.30am on Thursday (Oct 27), three hours after it was affected by a track fault at Bugis, with commuters experiencing delays and slower trains due to congestion during the morning peak.

This is the fourth disruption in a week for the East-West MRT line.

SMRT explained on its Facebook page at 11.55am that the train service was delayed "due to a track circuit fault" near Bugis station at 8.10am. It also stated that trains "travelled at a slower speed over the affected stretch" and "some westbound trains were turned around to ease congestion during the morning peak".

According to SMRT, engineers were only able to assess the fault after the morning peak at 10.55am as "track access is required for inspection".

SMRT first tweeted about the track fault at 8.43am, saying that commuters should allow for 15 minutes of additional travel time from Pasir Ris to Bugis stations towards Joo Koon and that the train service was still available.

It tweeted again 22 minutes later to advise of an additional 20-minute delay along the East-West Line from Pasir Ris to Joo Koon.

A few minutes later, the additional travel time was updated to 25 minutes.

Commuters mentioned that the delay took longer than the announced time, while another commented that the train "stops every minute".

Some commuters commented on the repeated breakdowns.

A commuter also complained of being stuck in the train for almost 30 minutes.

At 10.26am, SMRT tweeted to announce an additional 15 minutes travel time from Pasir Ris to Bugis towards Joo Koon.

The additional travel time was reduced to 10 minutes at 10.47am.

At 11.06am, additional travel time on the East-West Line towards Joo Koon was five minutes.

At 11.45am, SMRT announced that the fault had been cleared and train service was running normally on the East-West Line.