A West Japan Railway Co. official briefs reporters Sunday at a train depot in Fukuoka Prefecture about how an aluminum plate fell off a speeding Sanyo Shinkansen Line bullet train the previous day, causing the component to hit several windows and damage a

A West Japan Railway Co. official briefs reporters Sunday at a train depot in Fukuoka Prefecture about how an aluminum plate fell off a speeding Sanyo Shinkansen Line bullet train the previous day, causing the component to hit several windows and damage a power cable.
KYODO
NATIONAL
Police probe possible negligence in Fukuoka shinkansen electricity failure
KYODO
• AUG 9, 2015
FUKUOKA – Police on Sunday began probing an electricity failure on a Sanyo Shinkansen Line bullet train the previous day caused by an aluminum plate falling off the train as it hurtled down the tracks at a speed of 285 kph.

Local police entered West Japan Railway Co.’s train depot in Fukuoka Prefecture and examined the train, Sakura 561, suspecting a possible maintenance flaw and negligence resulting in injury. One passenger was injured in the incident.

The railway operator, also known as JR West, said electricity failed between Kokura and Hakata stations in the prefecture at around 5:30 p.m. Saturday, causing the Sakura 561 train to come to a sudden stop.

JR West checked the track and found the aluminum part in a tunnel. The 6.5-kg plate, 71 centimeters wide and 62 cm in height, had fallen off the second car of the eight-car train bound for Kagoshima Chuo Station from Shin-Osaka Station.

After falling off the train, the plate ricocheted off the tunnel wall and the train, damaging it in three areas and also wrecking a wire that supplies electricity to the overhead cables, the railway operator said. The electricity is believed to have failed because the wire shorted out, it added.

The nearly full train had about 500 passengers aboard.

A 26-year-old high school teacher from Kagoshima sustained minor injuries to her left wrist and elbow, police said.

The metal plate had been examined in the past two days and JR West found no abnormalities in a check Friday, it said.

The incident caused delays of up to 97 minutes for 53 trains on the Sanyo Shinkansen Line, affecting about 15,100 passengers, during the already congested start of the Bon holidays.