So, an article in Aftenposten about how the automated emergency systems in the Japanese Shinkansen reacted much faster and correct than humans possibly can, and stopped the trains before the earthquake struck. This probably saved tons of lives as having an earthquake strike the tracks at 400 km/h is not something you’d like to see. Some damage was recorded on and near the tracks, good thing the trains were halted when the power lines went down.
Oh, look! There’s an article just below on the front page about the Norwegian railway system. Let’s have a look.
…right. At one of the railway tracks passing through Oslo, a derailments happened when the wooden ties (seriously, wooden ties on a busy track in 2011?) slipped out of alignment and destabilized the track. The ties were so rotten that the fixing plate screws could be unfastened by hand, said the investigators.
As a passionate advocate for public transport, this is quite disheartening to read.
One one hand you have a country being hit by the biggest quake in modern history, and everything went according to plan.
On the other, you have a piece of critical infrastructure, man rated (meaning it’s qualified to carry persons), going through the capital of the country and maintenance is ignored for decades resulting in a critical failure. Pure luck, and nothing else save lives that evening.