BEIJING - About 91 million Chinese are expected to hit the rails during the upcoming Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holidays this year, the Ministry of Railways (MOR) said on Thursday.    

The MOR said it will give top priority to ensuring safe transportation, particularly for its high-speed trains and passenger suites.

The number of passengers traveling during the Mid-Autumn Festival holiday, which lasts from September 10 to 12, will increase by 12.3 percent from a year earlier to reach 22 million, the MOR said in a statement on its website.

For the seven-day National Day holiday, which begins on October 1, 69 million passengers are predicted to travel by train, up 8.5 percent year-on-year.

The holiday season travel peak will arrive on October 1, a day on which 8.5 million people are expected to take trains, according to the MOR.

Last Sunday, the MOR ordered its trains to run at slower speeds, as safety concerns have been raised in the wake of a deadly train crash that killed 41 people in the city of Wenzhou in east China's Zhejiang Province on July 23.