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China Opens World's Longest High-Speed Rail Line

CRH380 (China Railway High-speed) Harmony bullet trains are seen at a high-speed train maintenance base in Wuhan, Hubei province, early December 25, 2012.

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VOA News

December 26, 2012

The world's longest high-speed rail line began operations in China Wednesday.

The first train of the 2,298-kilometer Beijing-to-Guangzhou route departed from the capital at 9:00 a.m. local time (0100 GMT), with a second train departing an hour later from Guangzhou.

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Trains on the new route will travel at 300 kilometers an hour, which will reduce the travel time between Beijing and the southern economic hub from more than 20 hours to just eight.

The Chinese government is planning to build a network of high-speed railways, with four east-west lines and four north-south lines in operation by 2020.

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by: Anonymous

December 26, 2012 11:27 PM

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you have to admit that the speed have never seen in Japan

by: Jonathan Huang from: canada

December 26, 2012 6:19 PM

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Impressive! and Congrats to China on Xmas!
I also see a lot of sour grapes, LOL
As far as I know, Chinese trains are faster than Japanese. So stop the nonsense about stealing.
In fact, the Chinese high speed train system is a hybrid of German, French and Japanese technologies, thus the best and fastest! But it is fully made in China now! LOL

by: Samurai from: Japan

December 26, 2012 8:34 AM

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Congratulations on world's longest high-speed train! But, it looks like a Japanese bullet train. Although Chinese claims that it is their own technology, they must have stolen Japanese technology. Chinese passengers, be careful! Your engineers have never stolen Japanese technology of safety.

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by: Larry Tan from: Duncan Canada

December 27, 2012 4:24 PM

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cantt you contain your jealousy and bafoonry? how long have you wait for the next china train smashup.....dare i speculate japan will do it sooner?

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by: Jonathan Huang from: canada

December 26, 2012 6:27 PM

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@Samurai from: Japan, what technology of safety? like that in the Fukushima nuclear plant disaster? due to their stupidity, thousands tons of radioactive waste water was dumped into pacific ocean and they were trying to cover that from the notice of the world.
Japan is a hopeless country, RIP.

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by: Steven from: USA

December 26, 2012 12:12 PM

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Samurai, you must have forgotten that Siemens(Germany) won over Japan in building China's bullet trains. AND, Japan's train technologies were borrowed from Germany.

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China Opens World's Longest High-Speed Rail Line

<h1>China Opens World's Longest High-Speed Rail Line </h1><img src="http://www.voanews.com/App_Themes/VOA_en-US/img/colorLogo.gif"/>The world's longest high-speed rail line began operations in China Wednesday.<br /> <br /> The first train of the 2,298-kilometer Beijing-to-Guangzhou route departed from the capital at 9:00 a.m. local time (0100 GMT), with a second train departing an hour later from Guangzhou.  <br /> <br /> <div class='embedded_content_object'><div onclick="expandMedia('3bba54081fe44eebb760cc677d94d9a0','Big')" id='expandSmall3bba54081fe44eebb760cc677d94d9a0' class='expandSmall floatLeft' style='width:268px'><div class='contentImage floatLeft' style='width:268px'><img class='photo' alt="Click to Enlarge" border='0' src='http://gdb.voanews.com/8D6C08A4-1943-4CBE-85C8-2F93B1F5C9AB_w268_r1.png' /><span class='imageCaption'>Click to Enlarge</span></div></div><div id='expandBig3bba54081fe44eebb760cc677d94d9a0' class='item_hide'><div class='contentImage floatNone'><div class='expandMediaClose' onclick="expandMedia('3bba54081fe44eebb760cc677d94d9a0','Small')"><span>x</span></div><div class='watermark'><a href='http://gdb.voanews.com/8D6C08A4-1943-4CBE-85C8-2F93B1F5C9AB_mw1024_n_s.png' rel='ibox' title="Click to Enlarge"><img class='photo' alt="Click to Enlarge" border='0' src='http://gdb.voanews.com/8D6C08A4-1943-4CBE-85C8-2F93B1F5C9AB_w640_r1_s.png' /></a></div><span class='imageCaption'>Click to Enlarge</span></div></div></div> Trains on the new route will travel at 300 kilometers an hour, which will reduce the travel time between Beijing and the southern economic hub from more than 20 hours to just eight.<br /> <br /> The Chinese government is planning to build a network of high-speed railways, with four east-west lines and four north-south lines in operation by 2020.<br /> <br /> <strong>Related Video footage</strong><br /> <br /> <div><div id="v0b889123ef85470f8c15ac6d18789171" class="mediaplayer videoplayer"> <div 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