About 1,000 passengers spent the night inside five Japan Railway trains that were stranded on the JR Takasaki Line in Saitama Prefecture, apparently because of frozen power lines, East Japan Railway Co. officials said Saturday.
More than 3,000 passengers were stranded when 11 trains on JR's Takasaki and Tohoku lines came to a halt at stations in Saitama Prefecture after a power failure was reported just before 10 p.m. Friday. In all, some 47,900 people on the two lines in Saitama and Tochigi prefectures were affected, the officials said.
While most passengers were able to return home by other means of transportation, about 1,000 on the Takasaki Line had to spend the night aboard the trains, with JR East providing them with meals.