The stale bread was given to people travelling on the popular route from Tokyo to Osaka.

Typhoon Lan caused havoc in Japan earlier this week, bringing torrential rain and storm conditions that caused a fire on one train due to a lightning strike, and created a scare in another part of the country with one of their tall structures.

The country’s Shinkansen bullet train system also experienced problems, with suspended services causing long delays due to the strong winds which created dangerous conditions for Japan’s fast rail network. The exemplary service usually experienced on the Shinkansen also took a bit of a nose-dive due to the typhoon, with passengers reporting that they were served stale bread while stranded on one of the trains.

According to JR East, on the night of the typhoon, which made landfall in Shizuoka Prefecture at approximately 3:00 a.m. on 23 October, a Tokaido Shinkansen Kodama train bound for Osaka was forced to cease operations due to the dangerous weather conditions. The train stopped at Atami Station in Shizuoka Prefecture and at about 3:00 a.m., the rail staff handed out bread to the stranded passengers, who had no other choice but to stay inside the train for an extended period of time while the rail service was suspended.

JR East says that the bread they handed out was taken from canned stockpiles at the station which were kept in case of emergency situations, with an extended shelf-life of five years. 128 lots of bread were distributed to passengers, however a number of people pointed out that the bread had gone past its expiry date, with dates of 12 and 20 August 2017 marked on the packages.

The rail company has apologised, saying it recalled 15 lots of bread which had gone over the expiry date, and no passengers became ill over the incident.

Source: Asahi Shimbun via Otakomu
Featured image: Flickr/Takeshi Kuboki