Graffiti attack forces suspension of bullet train service

With all the extra anti-terror security precautions accompanying the G8 summit, you’d think that JR might have been able to prevent an intruder from entering their storage area at night and vandalizing trains:

According to railway officials, graffiti reading “Hack” in English was found on the side of a carriage of a Joetsu Shinkansen train parked at a train depot of East Japan Railway Co. (JR East) in Tokyo’s Kita-ku at around 5 a.m. on Tuesday.

A driver who was inspecting trains at the depot found the graffiti and reported the incident to Takinogawa Police Station.

JR East suspended a train service on the Joetsu Shinkansen Line as it tried to erase the graffiti on the train that was to be used on the line, affecting about 500 passengers.

11 comments - What do you think? Posted by James - July 1, 2008 at 2:06 pm

Categories: Odd / Strange Tags: bullet train, japan, shinkansen

nanya

badass! hiphop lives!
shazzb0t

Wow.. That is gutsy. Though I like graffiti I would rather not see it on the trains in Japan. I wonder who did this. I’m leaning towards a foreigner though of course I can’t be sure.

Maya clan

I think a Japanese did it, Alot of Japanese copy foreign Graffiti in english, just like they mimic everything else poorly…as long as people can write, there will be graf…to hit a train like that was gold, he is famous now in the world of graf (aerosal art), but to ground the train…how stupid…but JR didnt wanna look stupid with that ridding around, so sure just like you thinking blame the foreigner cos its in english like Japanese cant write english..and cos it in english a lot of people will blame foreigners,

http://chirimotsumoreba.net shazzb0t

The reason I thought it was a foreigner is because a few of the Japanese graf writers I’ve talked to said they don’t bomb trains simply because they have a respect for the transit system that Westerners didn’t have. They also said that getting caught in the train yards have very high fines.

Anyways, I doubt dude is going to be ‘famous in the world of graf’ as the train runs from Niigata to Tokyo. That is hardly considered going ‘all city’.

Saying it was a foreigner had nothing to do with the fact that the graf was in English.

mortonsalt

turk 182
Jake

Japanese writers bomb trains on the regular…..

Not a bad throw up considering the location and possible security.

http://chirimotsumoreba.net shazzb0t

Hmm.. I have never seen a bombed train in Tokyo. I doubt that it happens ‘on the regular’ for the simple fact that if that was the case railway officials wouldn’t have held up service. If it was happening all the time either 1. you would see more of it (which you don’t) or 2. the trains in Japan would grind to a hault in order to repaint them constantly.
Get a Job, Son!

I dont know which Japan Jake lives in… yet to see any trains with any ‘throw-up’… except of course for drunk salary-men.
Trains are not ‘bombed’ here… ‘on the regular’ or otherwise.

http://chirimotsumoreba.net shazzb0t

Seriously, no clue what Jake has seen. I was honest to god shocked when I found a glass etching inside a train on the sobu sen. Literally shocked. I was looking for graf too. Found neckface all over Shibuya, found your ubiqitious OBEY Giant, I mean I saw BNE stickers all over the place, but not once did I see something like that in a train, inside or out. Just didn’t see it.

I’ve never seen a tag, a throw up, a piece, nothing on the side of a train in the entire year or so I lived in Japan. Maybe things have changed recently though I doubt it. I’ll see when I get back.

Get a Job, Son!

Ive been here for over 6 yrs… never seen grafitti here ‘on the regular’ (love that hipster doofus english).
As mentioed before, if a train sevice can be stopped, and the news of the grafitti make national evening news, then it must be RARE!!

As to BNE stickers, they are also about in other countries too (Australia and UK to name 2)… so one would think this is either a westerner in Japan doing it, or some other ‘network’… underground or otherwise.
http://chirimotsumoreba.net shazzb0t

That was what I was thinking. If this cause such a stir it couldn’t be all that common for trains to be painted up.

The BNE stickers are definitely the work of a network of people. They are found all over the place from New York to London, but curiously enough, not in or on trains in Japan. If people hesitate to put stickers on the trains why would the put up a piece? Pretty much the same thoughts here.

If you go to Shibuya and wander you can see all sorts of graf, but in a place like that you can expect it. The curious thing though is that as you get closer to the JR station you don’t see as much. Inside the JR station you can’t see anything. Obviously there is more security and more people there, but it still goes to show how different people view public transport in Japan as opposed to elsewhere.

Graffiti attack forces suspension of bullet train service

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