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Who produced Subway Tragedy

By Li Hongmei
Updated: 2008-11-21 10:50

Subway tunnel collapse which came about last Saturday inHangzhouCity, capital ofChina’s easternZhejiangProvincehas so far claimed 9 lives, and left 12 missing with the remote hope of survival. The tragedy occurred when a 75-meter-long section of the tunnel suddenly caved in onFengqing Avenuein Xiaoshan District, and a nearby river flowed into the tunnel soon after the collapse. For all these days, rescue teams have been racing against time to find the missing workers trapped underground at the once bustling construction site, but the search has proved to be a complete failure, as the first 72 hours crucial to the survival chances of injured and missing individuals has long elapsed.

The calamity, most deadly ever in the history of subway building history since the founding of newChina, shocked the whole nation and captured the forefront attention of the world media. People could not help but wonder what or who to blame for the deadly accident, but nothing of great value has come to light as the conclusive evidence revealing the root cause. Although the probe attempting to trace the cause is still going on, many speculations and assumptions have emerged on Internet. The online points are divided, but the netizens chiefly centered round the list of accusations as follows: shoddy construction, subcontract- and outsourcing-induced problems in the process of construction, rushing to meet the deadline, slack monitoring system, and lack of the adequate geographical concerns prior to the construction.

With time, many more tend to believe it is a man-made disaster, rather than merely an accident, and situations seem more subtle and complicated. The spokesman forChina’s Railway Construction Group, the team in charge of the subway construction, even shed tears when pressed by the media to identify the cause for the collapse. Mainly three parties have been well and truly stuck in a swirl of the nationwide dispute—the party in charge of the construction, the managerial staff responsible for the construction supervision, and the local governments both at the city level ofHangzhouand the provincial level ofZhejiang.

The latest information leaked from the construction unit Wednesday shed rare light on the problems existent in the construction planning and management, which said the special soil texture and moisture had been given little priority in planning the subway construction, as the construction unit was supposed to have had enough experience in dealing with various properties of soil; and which said the party in charge of the project management and supervision had placed more pressure on the construction unit urging them to finish the project in less than a year and a half, which is ahead of schedule due within three years.

On the other hand, the ordinaryHangzhoucitizens have their say concerning the catastrophe, and some even told the media signs of disaster had already surfaced crystal clear long before the fatal accident, while the construction unit did nothing to remedy, but continued digging up. Residents living nearby said they had noticed a large crater of road about 20-meter wide over the construction site, and a construction worker also echoed the statement saying one month before the accident they had found cracks appearing in the road and had reported this to the department higher up. To this, the managerial department replied that they had already reported the situation toHangzhoumunicipal government, but received no reply.

BothHangzhoumunicipal government andZhejiangprovincial government, however, rebutted it saying they had never and ever received any report pinpointing the problems occurring in the subway construction. ‘Even if you reported the problems to us following the formalities, you are the unit in charge of the construction job, and you are duty-bound to remedy them before things go worse,’ said a source close to the municipal government.

The case is still under investigation, and the parties in question are still trying to clear themselves off the responsibilities they should have assumed. The tragedy takes a heavy toll on lives and properties, disables the ongoing massive construction ofHangzhousubway, with the investment up to 22 billion yuan, and raises suspicion on the safety of national investment, as the newly-staged 4-trillion-yuan stimulus package could set up a new flurry of infrastructure construction nationwide. National Development and Reform Commission said that there was already a long waiting list of cities applying for the rights and investments to build subways.