On Tuesday (March 2, 2004) a commuter train en route to Seremban collided into a stationary one located just outside a tunnel near the Tiroi station. I saw the damage myself because I was travelling in a later train that day.

It was the first major accident involving commuter trains in Malaysia since its inception in 1996. Fortunately, there was no fatality among the 600 plus passengers on board the two trains, but we still do not know the extent of their psychological trauma.

For over four years now, I use the commuter trains daily to travel to and from Seremban/ KL Sentral to get to work.

As a regular commuter, I must commend KTMB for their quick rescue work on the day of the collision. However, KTMB's information boys at a time of crisis appear non-existent.

I boarded the later train after the one involved in the accident and was stranded between Labu and Tiroi for an hour not knowing that there was an accident. If my mother did not call me on the mobile telling me about the accident I wouldn't have known about it.

What was an announcement not made? Surely, that information should have been passed to the passengers soon after the accident so that they could make alternative arrangement for transport.

The following day, chaos reigned over the KTMB trains' schedules. In fact there was an absence of information from the management. Even regular commuters who had gotten accustomed to the 'biasa-lah' KTMB trains' delay were losing patience because they had to wait for an hour in a stationary commuter train at the Seremban station, not knowing if the train would eventually depart or not.

I think KTMB has not been acting in a responsible manner by not providing full information of train re-schedules at the stations when repair work was being undertaken. Such information would have saved the commuters precious time and patience.

I feel that the single most frustrating point of the KTMB operation is their lack of the human element. Don't blame commuters if they think that all KTMB think of is profit maximization, even in crisis situations like flash floods or landslides affecting their track routes.

KTMB has buck up its information system and certainly, its human touch when handling crisis situations.