A train operator with 39 years of experience serves his last Spring Festival travel rush (3)

 Qing Taigang, a high-speed train operator with the Chongqing Locomotive Division from Chengdu Bureau of China Railway Group Co., Ltd, has been an operator for 39 years. This year marks his last Spring Festival travel rush before he retires.

Due to the complex geological conditions in southwest China, which is more mountainous than other parts of China, Qing made considerable efforts to ensure the safety of the train before it set off to pass through the mountain area.

With years of experience, Qing repeatedly calculated, tested, and summarized the driving essentials of the gradient sections, and summed up a set of driving modes suitable for the mountain-region railways. There is even a studio named after him as recognition of his technical problem solving skills.

Qing has also spared no effort to foster new generations of operators. The number of high-speed operators who have been trained by him has exceeded 300. In March of this year, he will be 55 years old, which means it is time for him to retire. In the very last Spring Festival rush of his career, he will be with his passengers from start to finish.

Qing has witnessed the rapid development of the multiple-unit (MU) train development in the geologically complicated region of southwest China as part of China’s reform and opening-up efforts.

In 1952, the first railway in southwest China was launched and in 2013 the first MU railway in the region was put into operation. One year later, the region’s first passenger high-speed rail started service.

By the end of 2017, the national railway operating mileage reached 127,000 kilometers, including 25,000 kilometers of high-speed rail, occupying 66.3% of the world’s total high-speed rail, according to China Railway. Many of those new railways are connected with southwest China, including Xi’an-Chengdu Railway and Chongqing-Guiyang Railway, which are all expected to bolster local economic development.