Patrol group keeps trains running at speed

A team of four men aged between their early 20s and mid-30s carry tool boxes along a stretch of high-speed rail through the mountains day after day. In the course of a month, they walk as many as 300 kilometers.

If this was the plot of a movie, they probably would be members of a gang of train robbers but in reality, the men walking through the Wuyi Mountains in eastern China's Fujian province are members of a high-speed rail patrol team.

Their main responsibility is to remove any hazards to bullet train operations they might find along the way.

"We ensure the tracks are in good condition and also prevent outside factors like fallen rocks on the tracks from affecting operations," said Li Min, a member of the patrol team.

China has the world's longest high-speed railway network, which covers a total of 40,000 km. There are thousands of patrol workers along the network but what is unique about Li's team is the added responsibility they have related to wildlife and environmental protection.

He and his colleagues patrol back and forth along a 150-km section of the high-speed line linking Hefei in Anhui province and Fuzhou, the capital of Fujian. Bullet trains travel the 850-km line at speeds of up to 300 km per hour.

The team walks between three stations along the line－Wuyishan North, Nanping and Jian'ou West－all located in the Wuyi Mountains. "Most of the trip involves walking up and down the mountains," Li said.

Their section runs through the Wuyi Mountain National Park, which is home to many animals, including hares, squirrels, as well as rare species such as the red slender loris, macaques and pythons.

To stop animals from crossing the tracks, the team has added a 1-meter-tall metal fence on top of existing protective barriers.

"The standard height for protective barriers along high-speed tracks in China is 2.7 meters, which can stop most animals from jumping onto them in most places. But here in the mountains, animals can jump over the barriers from higher up the slopes, so we've increased the height of the security fence for safety, and also to protect the animals," Li said.

In addition, the grid interval for standard fencing is 10 centimeters, mainly to prevent people from trespassing but the team have added a second layer of fencing with a grid interval of 3.5 cm outside the safety barriers to stop the animals.

"We consulted professionals from the national park about what kind of animals live here. They told us that most are small. We realized the 10 cm gap would not stop small animals from crossing the tracks, so we added the new layer," he said.

The patrolmen make the extra fencing themselves and usually carry seven to eight sections of the fencing during their patrol.

Each section weighs about 10 kilograms. "The metal fencing sometimes gets broken by wild animals and if we don't repair it on time, it leaves a gap for animals to get in," said Xu Hengtao, head of the team.

Thanks to abundant sun and rain, trees grow quickly in the Wuyi Mountains. However, rather than take pleasure in the scenery, the patrolmen view each tree as a potential source of trouble.

"We used to cut down trees that encroached on the network for safety reasons, but now we just trim them to reduce the impact on the environment," another team member, Zhu Qingxin, said.

The railway crosses many bridges due to the topography. Engineers usually install metal fencing across the piers of a bridge to keep people and animals out.

But in the Wuyi Mountains, they encircle each individual pier with fencing instead. This prevents animals from climbing onto the tracks but leaves enough room for them to pass between the piers.

Li Min and Xu Hengtao encountered their first wild animal at work two years ago. One morning at dawn, they came across a red slender loris sitting still on the tracks.

"Its red eyes twinkled in the dark. I did not know it was red slender loris, I thought it might be an owl," Li recalled, adding that he searched online to identify the animal later.

Xu picked the primate up in his hands and placed it safely under a tree.

"It was not large, more like a small dog. Once I put it under the tree, it jumped back into the forest," Li said.

"Our awareness of environmental protection has increased thanks to information given to us by the authorities and our company. In addition to prioritizing safety, we now also take environmental protection into consideration," he added.

The railway sector is paying increasing attention to environmental protection, from design to construction.

The team of four is one squad in a larger division established last year by the China Railway Nanchang Group, the regional railway operator.

With a total of 63 patrolmen, the division is usually split into smaller units of three to five members, responsible for ensuring rail safety and protecting the environment.

The Spring Festival travel rush, which is known in Chinese as chunyun, began on Jan 17 and will end on Feb 25. A total of 1.18 billion passenger trips are expected to be made during the 40-day period.

With extra services arranged to cater to the rush, more patrols are also carried out to ensure the safety of passengers and wildlife alike, Xu said.