Railway Accident Investigation Status and Issues in Taiwan

In addition to damage to facilities, interruption of routes, and inconvenience to passengers, railway accidents are likely to cause serious injuries and threaten life and property. We should make every effort to prevent these unpleasant events. More importantly, lessons should be learnt from every accident to identify the mistakes and make improvements to prevent the same tragedy from happening again. This study reviews the history of railway accident investigation in Taiwan and the current status of accident investigation mechanisms for different railway/metro systems, such as conventional railway, high-speed rail, and metro systems. We compare and discuss representative accidents at different stages to demonstrate the variances in investigation body, independence, resources, quality, and countermeasures. The investigation quality and resources for railway accidents have remarkably improved over time, but further enhancements are needed to resolve issues in the current mechanism. Existing issues are presented at the end of the article to provide further improvements in the railway accident investigations in Taiwan.