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236 SIMILAR POINTS TO THE ACCIDENTS HAVE BEEN FOUND! The Doro-Chiba railway trade union has presented the File 25 - demanding a proper investigation of the broken rails, and the File 26 - demanding an end to unlawful punishment in Chiba driving district to prohibit drivers to work on the trains (reported on the Daily Doro-Chiba No.5877 & No.5880). We met with the Chiba District of Japan Railway (JR) Co. at 10am on 21 May regarding these issues. This is a report on the result of the File 25 here. We will report to you on the File 26 another day. NO ANSWER SINCE OUR FIRST DEMAND IN FEBRUARY Unprecedented accidents have happened since the beginning of this year, like the broken rails between Tsudanuma and Makuhari on Sobu Rapid Line, and the reduction of the tracks as a result of sleepers' gaps. Our union has demanded the bosses examine the cause, take immediate counter measures, and report what they have found and done to the trade union. We have also stepped up our fight for rail safety. We presented the File 25 because the JR Chiba District have given no explanation either of the cause of the accidents, or of any further progress despite of our demands in February and March. THE 76 SIMILAR POINTS IN SOBU RAPID LINE On 21 May 2004, at the negotiation table, representatives of JR Chiba District said: "The cause is now under investigation by the Railway Technical Research Institute", "It seems to take 6 months to find an answer", "When the report is completed, it will be made available to the trade union", but they could identify no specific cause at that moment. In terms of the service life of rail tracks, they said: "It depends on passage tonnage. Its limitation is 800 million tons in Sobu Rapid Line. Now, it is 32 million tons per annum, and the track is supposed be changed every 25 years. The present rail tracks have been set just after division & privatization in 1987. Seventeen years have been passed since then, but it still has 8 years before its service life ends." "We suppose now that metal fatigue may be the cause of the snapping, and we are trying to verify this in order to find the countermeasure. We have to just wait for the results of the investigation." They revealed details of where points similar to those in the accidents were found and where they had marked points for observation or reinforcement with metal boards: * As to similar points within the Chiba jurisdiction:
LOOSE BOLTS HAVE BEEN FOUND AT 60 PLACES Also they could not explain why sleepers (ties) have been shifted and the orbit of the track has been reduced. The man in charge of facilities in JR Chiba district could say nothing but "We do not understand at all", "It seems to me that it has occurred as a result of some kind of shock". As to the sheared off bolts on the Togane Line, they explained: "The rail tracks were laid in 1993. It seems the bolt was screwed too tightly, and sheared off with the shock of the running train. We inspected our area and found 60 loose bolts. We have squeezed them with an appropriate torque." "DEREGULATION", "SPEED-UP", "SUBCONTRACTING" They have never been able to give a concrete reason for the accidents. And in addition, a very serious situation has been revealed as mentioned above: 236 similar points to where the track snapped and 10 % of them needing to be reinforced with connection boards. This tells us the same "broken rails" can happen anywhere. This is, in a sense, an inevitable consequence of reduced examinations caused by "deregulation" - bigger shocks on rail tracks because of "speed-up" and lower technical ability of workers deriving from cost cutting, staff cuts and "subcontracting". Therefore, the only the way we can move forward is to fight against the "rationalization" introduced by the JR Company and JR-Union combo. Step up the fight against "rationalization" and for the rail safety from every workplace. Report on any accident, trouble or failed rail tracks! DORO-CHIBA (DC): National Railway Locomotive Power Union of Chiba
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