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You mean Zibo train incident. To which the first reaction was:
Beijing - Qingdao T195 Train Crash | Qingdao China Guide
Chen Gong 陈功, head of the railway bureau in Jinan, Shandong's capital, and Jinan's Party Secretary, Chai TieMin 柴铁民, were fired and are being investigated in connection with the accident.
Which seems a rather nervous "we are doing something" move. The responsibility of the two local officials (or even that of any of their underlings) is not at all certain before one knows the cause. Indeed the local CYA was:
AFP: China blames high speed for train disaster
A local official at the scene of Monday's pre-dawn crash near Zibo city in eastern China's Shandong province also sought to blame the driver of the train from Beijing, believed to have been carrying more than 1,000 people."It's human error. The train was going way too fast," Zibo city spokesman Li Chenggang told AFP.
A local official at the scene of Monday's pre-dawn crash near Zibo city in eastern China's Shandong province also sought to blame the driver of the train from Beijing, believed to have been carrying more than 1,000 people.
"It's human error. The train was going way too fast," Zibo city spokesman Li Chenggang told AFP.
As for the reason for the nervousness, it appears to be quite explicit:
Another reason for the haste appeared to be China's determination to show the accident had caused no major disruption ahead of the Beijing Olympics in August, especially with Qingdao serving as a venue."The country has responded very quickly to this. The government has wanted to make sure all the injured are taken care of well and to get the line running as quickly as possible," Zibo spokesman Li said."The Olympics are coming."
Another reason for the haste appeared to be China's determination to show the accident had caused no major disruption ahead of the Beijing Olympics in August, especially with Qingdao serving as a venue.
"The country has responded very quickly to this. The government has wanted to make sure all the injured are taken care of well and to get the line running as quickly as possible," Zibo spokesman Li said.
"The Olympics are coming."
Not to mention the Qingdao train accident You mean Zibo train incident. To which the first reaction was:
Right. The train was on the way from Beijing to Qingdao and derailed at Zibo.
Yes, it is standard operating procedure, in China as everywhere, to put the blame on human error when billions of dollars of investment stand to be lost if true causes turn out to be more damning, especially when national honor is at stake. Investigators will even go so far as to tamper with evidence.
See the Airbus A320 disaster in Muhouse, France, for instance: Pilot Error Is Blamed in Airbus Crash - New York Times A language is a dialect with an army and navy.
(Incidentally, from a Japanese perspective, firing higher-up's for the egregious failures of those they are responsible for is completely logical and a matter of course. And ultimately I believe this view of responsibility comes from Confucianism. Although I did not think that this notion of responsibility was still active in China today, perhaps it in fact is, and if so, would be another reason why firing the head of the local railway bureau chief and the local Party Secretary would make perfect sense in this situation.) A language is a dialect with an army and navy.
