Mobile Phones 'Sok' Fallen into Subway Platform Gaps... 547 Cases This Year Alone

1276 Lost Items on Railway Tracks This Year
Followed by 203 Bluetooth Earphones
Remember Drop Location and Report to Customer Safety Office

Cell phone dropped on subway tracks Photo by Yonhap News

As of August this year, it has been revealed that passengers on the Seoul subway dropped a total of 547 mobile phones onto the tracks while boarding or alighting from trains.

According to Seoul Metro on the 15th, a total of 1,276 track-lost items were reported to the corporation from January to August this year. Among them, mobile phones accounted for 547 cases, making up 42.9%.

Next were electronic devices such as Bluetooth earphones with 203 cases (15.9%), followed by wallets with 132 cases (10.3%). While wallets were the second most frequently lost items on the tracks after mobile phones during the same period last year, Bluetooth earphones rose to second place this year. Other items included clothing with 82 cases, cards with 34 cases, bags with 16 cases, and jewelry with 6 cases.

According to the corporation, the average monthly number of reported track-lost items has been increasing annually: 97 cases in 2021, 144 cases in 2022, and 160 cases as of August 2023. The number of track-lost items reported this year increased by 14% compared to the same period last year.

Since screen doors are installed in the Seoul subway, track-lost items often fall through the gap between the train and the platform during the process of passengers boarding and alighting after the screen doors open when the train arrives at the station.

The corporation cautioned that mobile phones can slip from passengers’ hands or earphones being worn can fall onto the tracks when passengers bump into each other or rush onto the train while boarding or alighting.

In case an item falls onto the tracks, passengers are advised not to panic but to remember the platform location where the item was dropped and report the type of item and platform location to the Customer Safety Office. The item can be retrieved the next day. Lost items on the tracks cannot be collected during train operation hours for safety reasons; instead, station staff collect them after operations end and hand them over starting the next day.

When lost items are reported at each station, they are first registered on the National Police Agency’s lost property portal site 'lost112 (www.lost112.go.kr)'. Afterwards, they are transferred to the lost property centers operated by each subway line. If passengers do not immediately retrieve their lost items, the items are kept for one week before being transferred to the police station.

Baekho, President of Seoul Metro, said, "To protect your valuable belongings and to safely use the subway while preventing accidents such as falls, it is important to remain calm and pay attention to the gap on the platform when using the train." He added, "We ask for your understanding that items dropped onto the tracks cannot be retrieved during operating hours due to safety measures."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.