Were you caught in a delay caused by a train fault earlier this morning (Aug 30)?

Chances are if you were taking the train on the East-West line, you probably met with some delay today, thanks to the track fault, unrelated to the new signalling system project, at Redhill station.

The delay has since been reduced from 15 minutes to 5 minutes, as of the time of writing.

This train fault occurred just two days after Transport Minister Khaw Boon Wan highlighted the challenges of the maintenance staff when it comes to upgrading their train track, and fixing faults within a very short span of time each night.

In a Facebook post on Monday (Aug 28), he said "We are working on it", which might be a reference to the SMRT tagline we see in their station posters and banners:

IN THE TRENCHES ?

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We are working on it. I visited Bishan Depot recently with SMRT's new Chairman Mr Seah Moon Ming. I first met Seah MM during SARS when he was chairing ST Electronics. We had to work fast together, to come out with new diagnostic devices, to pinpoint fever cases and identify contacts and track them down for possible isolation. It was a crisis and quick response, based on sound science and engineering was critical in the fight against SARS. We had a very fruitful partnership. After SARS, I asked him to help out again, on various occasions, to stabilise Ren Ci after the Ming Yi scandal, and in KTP Hospital to help put technology to good use in a hospital setting. I have no doubt his chairing #SMRT will speed up our efforts to raise rail reliability, to meet the new target of 1 million train-km before any delay exceeding 5 minutes.

Seah MM is a practical engineer who leads both from the trenches as well as from the board room. I joined him in the trenches recently, in the wee hours of the morning, to give support to our troops on the ground. I also brought some cookies to stock up their pantry, especially for those who will be starting shift later into the night. Maintenance work is not only physically punishing, but also a race against time. Every minute matters as we have only 4 hours every night after the last train pulls in. Within this short window, hundreds of maintenance crew work religiously on various parts of the train network. They grind, weld, scan the tracks, check the trains to eliminate possible faults. And on top of the regular maintenance schedule, they have to replace the ageing assets: sleepers, third rail, signalling equipment, power sub-stations etc. It is a thankless but critical job, so that #Singaporeans can wake up to smooth journeys to work and school. While the occasional brickbats may dampen their spirits, they are never daunted. Their focus is give their best so that Singaporeans can enjoy safe and reliable journeys.

#MostPrecious #OurTransportWorkers #AllAboutTrains

This also comes after a pretty serious series of peak-hour signalling fault service disruptions and delays on the North-South Line and the Downtown Line, which resulted in dozens of students queuing up to get excuse slips for their PSLE oral examinations, and bus drivers assigned to shuttle passengers on a route that they're unfamiliar with.

According to SMRT, the visit helped Khaw to understand the critical work their engineers and maintenance staff were up to, and "truly encouraged" the folks on the ground to do their best.

Indeed, we all have our gripes with the trains (and will probably still do so until the faults have all been ironed out), but seeing the staff racing against time, working through the night to fix, maintain and upgrade the rails, netizens were happy to commend them for their hard work:

But of course, you can't please everyone all the time — especially when a new train fault appears, causing dissatisfied netizens to comment on SMRT's Facebook post about Khaw's visit:

Seems like the advice of some has already fallen on deaf ears:

Oh well.

 

Top photo adapted from Khaw Boon Wan's Facebook post, SMRT Twitter page