A substation of Metro Line 2 in smoke. Photo: twitter.com/DanRV22

By MARK LORENZANA

Mexico City’s Metro Collective Transportation System suspended its Metro Line 2 on the morning of Monday, June 4, for three hours due to a malfunction in one of its substations caused by a short circuit. Service at all stations of Line 2 has since been restored.

Metro Line 2 runs from the Cuatro Caminos station to Tasqueña station. The suspension of service directly affected the section at ground level from the San Antonio Abad station to the end of the line at Tasqueña, and caused a domino effect of delays and interruptions in other stations of Line 2.

Guillermo Calderón Aguilera, general director of the Mexico City Metro, in an interview with W Radio, said that a short circuit in a substation located between Xola and Villa de Cortés stations caused the problem. Buses were provided to shuttle stranded passengers from the affected stations. Calderón Aguilera said that 1,300 people were evacuated.

Elements of Mexico City’s Secretariat of Citizen Security (SSC) were also deployed, and gave passengers a lift on their squad cars. Some photos of the incident were uploaded by passengers on their social media accounts.

The Metro Collective Transportation System has not exactly been smooth sailing under Mexico City Governor Claudia Sheinbaum’s watch.

Mexico City’s Metro Line 1, which runs from Observatorio to Pantitlán, will be closed starting Saturday, July 9, to undergo repairs. Service for Line 1 will be closed for at least a year. The same line was closed on Jan. 9 of last year, due to a fire at a subway control station, and was reopened on Jan. 25, 2021.

On May 3, 2021, an overpass in Line 12 of the Mexico City Metro collapsed beneath a passing train, killing 26 people and hospitalizing 98 others. An independent investigation into the collapse, produced by a Norwegian risk-management company, found that construction flaws led to the deadly accident. However, after more than a year since the train crash, the incident remains unresolved.