Korea Unveils New Bullet Train

The Korea Railroad Research Institute on Thursday unveiled a next-generation bullet train with a maximum speed of 430 km/h, the HEMU 430X. The HEMU on a test run covered a 28.2 km distance at a speed of 150 km/h from a station in Changwon, South Gyeongsang Province.

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The train was developed by the institute in collaboration with the Ministry of Land, Transport and Maritime Affairs, Hyundai Rotem and other companies since 2007 at a cost of W93.1 billion (US$1=W1,164). Last October, a test run reached a speed of 428.9 km/h.

HEMU stands for Highspeed Electric Multiple Unit, but the acronym also means "auspicious sea fog" in Korean.

The HEMU 430X, the world's fourth fastest high-speed train, stops at a station in Changwon, South Gyeongsang Province on Thursday.

It will be the fourth fastest high-speed train in the world, after France (575 km/h), China (486 km/h) and Japan (443 km/h). It can travel from Seoul to Busan in 90 minutes. The global competition had been sluggish since Germany broke the 400 km/h mark in 1988 and Japan in 1996, but it was reignited when a French train exceeded 500 km/h in 2007. China unveiled a bullet train that manages 486 km/h in December 2010 and developed a prototype reaching a maximum speed of 500 km/h a year later.

"We will keep working on increasing the speed and make it possible for a production model to operate at speeds of up to 430km/h around this fall", said Hong Soon-man of the institute. A researcher there said it will be possible to reach a maximum speed of 500 km/h within three years. "The high-speed train market will increase to over W450 trillion", said Dr. Mok Jin-yong at the institute. "Since speed represents the level of technological advancement, we cannot afford to lag behind in the competition".