High-speed progress signals end to guards
Print Edition
For 49-year-old Yu Jiangchong, this year’s Spring Festival rush may be his last on a train. Guards are being superseded by technology.
“Thirteen of us have been transferred to other posts. I’ll be lucky if I see out the year,” he said.
Yu has spent 26 years as a guard on the Taiyuan Railway Bureau’s Datong section in north China’s Shanxi Province.
His job is ostensibly to monitor operations and be prepared for emergencies, all the while sitting alone at the back of the train. When the train passes through stations, he signals with red and green flags to drivers and station staff. He can also access the train’s brakes and stop the train if necessity demands.
The only time he had to pull the lever was in 1995, when a carriage door on a moving freight train burst open.
He said the flapping open door could have caused untold damage to signaling gear along the track and disrupted operations along the line.
Zhi Xiquan, director of the Datong section, said the number of guards had fallen from more than 300 to a mere 50.
Railway construction in China has been at breakneck speed over the past 10 years. There are now more than 12,000 kilometers of high-speed lines with bullet trains running at up to 380 kilometers per hour. At that speed, keeping the train safe is impossible for a guard and electronic systems must do the job instead.
More and more guards have been given new jobs, and the remaining 6,000, including Yu, will leave their posts when “end of train devices” are installed on all passenger trains later this year. Their other tasks — safety checks before trains start moving and air pressure reporting — have been distributed among station staff and train stewards.
“The device is still being tested, but it will soon replace us,” Yu said.
He worries that technology cannot cover his job.
“What if the device breaks down? What if there is an unforeseeable emergency along the way? Unexpected cases have to be dealt with by people,” he said.
In July 2011, 40 people were killed in Wenzhou when two bullet trains crashed.
The crash was caused by a series of flaws in control systems.
“Human guards aided by devices are the best way to ensure safety,” Yu said.
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