East-West Line disruption to last for several more days

LTA and SMRT to prioritise repair and expedite restoring full service earlier

- Kenneth Cheng

The disruption of train services between Jurong East and Buona Vista stations on the East-West Line will last several more days, with rail operator SMRT aiming to restore services fully on Sept 30.

SMRT and the Land Transport Authority (LTA) had said earlier on Sept 26 that they aimed to partially restore services on Sept 27 by running a shuttle train service that would go up and down the affected four-station stretch every 20 minutes.

Shelving this plan late on Sept 26, LTA and SMRT said they had tried their best to make the shuttle service option work by speeding up repairs on one of the tracks.

"We have since determined that it can be done, but it would mean slowing down the repairs on the parallel damaged rail, as repairs cannot be done when the shuttle train service is in operation," they said.

On balance, it is "better to prioritise repair and expedite restoring full service earlier", rather than run the shuttle service, they added. "SMRT is aiming to restore full service on Monday (Sept 30), and running the shuttle train could risk delaying full restoration by at least a few days."

On Sept 25, a faulty train that was withdrawn from service and on its way back to a depot had caused extensive damage to tracks and trackside equipment near Clementi and Dover stations.

Singapore's second-longest rail disruption affected about 874,000 passengers over two days - some 358,000 passengers on Sept 25, and an estimated 516,000 on Sept 26.

It was triggered by a first-generation Kawasaki Heavy Industries train. The eastbound train encountered a fault near Clementi station at about 9am on Sept 25 and all passengers disembarked at that station.