Kyushu Railway Co is considering abandoning plans to resume its suspended ferry service between Fukuoka in southwestern Japan and South Korea's Busan, as well as exiting the business entirely, a company source said Friday, following revelations that its unit concealed a water seepage issue.
In remarks to Kyodo News, JR Kyushu President Yoji Furumiya maintained that the company's "aim to restart services is unchanged at the present time" while saying difficulties with disaster prevention measures could preclude a restart.
The source said Kyushu Railway is considering withdrawing from the business due to potential challenges in restoring public trust in its unit, JR Kyushu Jet Ferry Inc., and the costs associated with reinforcing the ferry. A final decision is expected within the month, the source added.
Before services were suspended in August over the water ingress, the unit was operating daily return voyages to the South Korean city on its Queen Beetle high-speed ferry.
An inspection by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism in August found that JR Kyushu Jet Ferry falsified the Queen Beetle's logbook to hide that it ran voyages from February to May despite knowledge of the immersion.
A third-party panel of lawyers established by JR Kyushu concluded that the cover-up resulted from JR Kyushu Jet Ferry prioritizing business interests and internal circumstances. The panel also identified the lack of a backup vessel for the Queen Beetle as an underlying issue.
The JR Kyushu group launched the route in 1991 and established the JR Kyushu Jet Ferry subsidiary in 2005. The Queen Beetle, designed and built by an Australian firm, began full service in November 2022 following the lifting of coronavirus border control measures.
