Cracks May Be The Result Of Derailment: Expert

The vice-chairman of the Institution of Railway Signal Engineers in Hong Kong said on Wednesday that he believes cracks found on the MTR tracks in Hung Hom could be the result of Tuesday's derailment and not the cause.

Henry Cheung said the derailed compartments could have hits the rails, leading to the cracks.

"From the information we get, we can eliminate certain areas, such as the signalling system, or the point machine or anything related to the software. I believe it is most likely the hardware or the rail or the train causing the derailment," he said.

Cheung also said it's unlikely that a foreign object caused the derailment near Hung Hom station. If there was a foreign object on the track at the time, it would have derailed the first train carriage, the expert said.

He also said a foreign object on the track need not mean it was a deliberate move. "A foreign object need not be sabotage. It could be a tree trunk, it could be a rock, it could be anything," he said.

But Cheung told RTHK's Janice Wong that the public should wait for the findings of ongoing investigations before reaching a conclusion.