PM Lee 'very worried' that problem causing train breakdown may recur

In the wake of what was possibly Singapore's worst train disruption in history, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong noted that the root cause of the power trips leading up to the breakdown had not yet been identified.

"Today fortunately trains ran without a glitch, so far. But because we have not identified the root cause of the power trips, we are still very worried that the problem may recur," the prime minister said in a Facebook post on Wednesday evening.

On Tuesday evening, SMRT's train services across the North-South and East-West Lines were both disrupted after a traction power trip occurred. Both lines were shut for more than two hours, leaving tens of thousands of commuters stranded during the evening peak period.

At a media briefing on Wednesday morning, the Land Transport Authority (LTA) had said that it was difficult to isolate the fault because of the size and complexity of the rail system, and that more time would be needed.

In his Facebook post on Wednesday evening, PM Lee expressed his concern about the major disruption to train services. "I had just recently visited the SMRT Bishan Depot, to see their maintenance operations and teams. So I went to the LTA Ops Centre this afternoon, to be briefed on the situation," he said.

"We are still trying to find out the cause of the problem. LTA and SMRT staff and engineers worked through the night checking trains, tracks and cables."

PM Lee added that he hoped that the faults would be identified and resolved quickly to prevent further inconvenience to commuters.