Beijing Railway Bureau apologizes for running shorter carriages during Golden Week

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Beijing Railway Bureau has apologized for running trains with shorter carriages during China's National Day holiday, which led to cases of passengers with seat tickets being forced to stand for hours on their journey.

The incident first came to light when a netizen named @sagelamu complained on social media platform Weibo that half of the carriages on a high-speed railway she boarded "disappeared", leaving more than half of the passengers onboard who purchased tickets with no seats.

Weibo user @sagelamu complained about the train's "missing" carriages. /Screenshot from Weibo

She said in the post that the railway should have 16 carriages, but somehow was given a train with only eight carriages.

The post soon went viral on social media and sparked a heated discussion among netizens. Many who experienced the same incident also expressed their dissatisfaction online and urged the railway department to explain what happened.

In response, Beijing Railway Bureau on Saturday released a statement on Weibo, apologizing for the inconvenience brought to the passengers. The bureau explained that due to a temporarily mechanical breakdown on Thursday, they launched an emergency plan, replacing the long-formation carriage with the short-formation carriage to ensure safety.

Beijing Railway Bureau released a statement on Weibo, regretting the inconvenience caused to the passengers. /Screenshot from Weibo

Passengers were informed of the temporary change by railway staff at the station or through messages broadcast on the speaker throughout the station. They were also offered the chance to rebook tickets or get full refunds.

In the statement, the bureau said that the high-speed railway G6284 bound for east China's Qinhuangdao City on Thursday and G6288 bound for north China's Tianjin City on Friday which was impacted by the temporary change had now resumed service.

Nevertheless, debate over how the railway bureau handled the incident and whether the bureau should compensate passengers is still ongoing.

A lawyer told China Central Television that the railway department should inform passengers of any changes in advance and give further explanations for any unexpected incidents because the train ticket is a certificate of the contract, which means there is a contractual relationship between the two sides.