RK700 kodama Shinkansen
Central Japan Railway Co. (JR Tokai) said Thursday it has received a warning from the transport ministry after eight of its drivers were found to have made phone calls and sent emails on their private cellphones while driving shinkansen trains.
A 31-year-old male driver of a bullet train bound for Tokyo from Shin-Osaka sent emails to three colleagues when the train was running on the Toyohashi-Hamamatsu section on the Tokaido Shinkansen Line on the night of Nov. 22. One of the colleagues alerted a superior the next day. The driver’s cellphone records showed he made three calls and sent 45 emails while driving bullet trains over a four-month period from late July.
JR Tokai has polled its 4,000 drivers and conductors on all of its lines and learned seven other shinkansen drivers had sent emails from their cellphones while on duty. Bullet trains have one driver but also run on an automatic control system.
The Japan Times Ltd. All rights reserved.
