Friday, September 22

Magnetic Levitation Train Accident: 21 were killed

A Magnetic Levitation Train was in its test drive when it crashed into a stationary working maintenace vehicle in Germany A Magnetic Levitation Train crashed into a stationary maintenace vehicle in Germany when it was in its test drive. It was a driverless train, and the speed of it was around 200km/h. At least 21 passengers were killed.

Magnetic Levitation Train is a cutting edge technology. It uses powerful magnets to float the train above the tracks, allowing the train to glide along without friction. China has the only commercial line in the world. In August, there was smoke in the train, but no one was injured.

The reason of this accident is unknown, but experts think it should be communication problem, not technologytechnical problem. At least, it should be a management problem. The test drive of Magnetic Levitation Train was in its routine drive, so the maintenance vehicle shouldn't have stopped in the spot.
People still think of technology to prevent such a disaster. Report says that the survived passengers saw the stopped vehicle, but they coudn't do anything since this is a driverless train. New technology should be applied to stop the car in emergency.

Posted at  9/22/2006 08:18:00 PM Permalink  Comments(2)
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2 Comments:

At September 22, 2006 9:01 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

"not echnology problem"-->should be "technical problem". (do you understand why?)

 
At September 23, 2006 5:30 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

--A ML train crashed into a stationary maintenance vehicle in Germany during a test drive.

Do you think the first sentence should focus on "crash" instead of "test drive?"

--The speed of the driverless train was around 200km/h.

--powerful magnets enable the train to float above and glide along the tracks without friction.

--but no one was injured.

-- be a communication problem or a management problem, not a technology problem.

I think this is a tech problem because the train should be able to detect the object ahead of it and stop itself. It is not a difficult tech. Besides, since the track is monitored, there must be some signals indicating in the system that there was something on the track.

 

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