This Japanese Bullet train literally left 200 passengers on the platform behind, many of them bewildered why the conductor decided to not open the doors for them.

In a country that measures train arrivals and departures on the dot and is known for its promptness and professionalism, this egregious act certainly must be grounds for a serious management check. According to the Huffington Post Japan on their report on the matter, they dropped earlier yesterday (Dec 15, 2017) bullet train Kodoma 684 which was headed from Tokaido station in Nagoya to Tokyo left about 200 passengers behind as it left. According to reports, the train didn’t get to far before someone reported and corrected the mistake.

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The Shinkansen only went a total of 20 meters before a station attendant on board literally slammed the emergency button (because in Japan, this would absolutely be considered an emergency) alerted the train’s conductor and backed the train up the whole 20 meters so the passengers left waiting could board and continue. So at the end of the day, no one was actually left behind and people were only delayed for a matter of minutes.

In response to this drama filled incident /s, Japan’s Shinkansen board has launched a full-fledged investigation into the matter. So far they’ve determined that

  1. The conductor looked out his window, saw closed doors, and assumed passengers were already boarded.
  2. The conductor was actually looking at doors that never opened.

“Although we will decide concrete measures after definitely clarifying the cause, we will strive to prevent recurrence and raise employee guidance and education thoroughly.”

This comes days after news of a crew reporting that they discovered a crack on one Shinkansen train that could’ve caused a derailment if not fixed. That train has since been pulled from duty and swapped for a fresh train so no one was really affected.

And early last November, I reported on one Japanese Railway issuing a press release for leaving 20 seconds.

Japanse media sure does make a lot of hubbub about issues where ultimately no one was affected.  In this case, only a handful of passengers were delayed and in those two previously mentioned incidences, no one was affected. Stories of this magnitude both are a daily occurrence for American trains and wouldn’t have made a blip on our news feeds.

It’s safe to say that if you’re a passenger on the Shinkansen, no passenger will be left behind.

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