Shenzhen Metro had carried more than 1.38 million passengers as of Monday, an average 197,000 passengers per day, Shenzhen Metro said at a press conference Tuesday.

"The operation of the Metro system has experienced great challenges over the past eight days," Jiang Weibin, operations manager of the Metro, said.

With about 110,000 passengers recorded on the first day of opening, the number hit a record on New Year's Day with 266,000 people taking to the subway.

At present, the maximum capacity of a train was 12,000 passengers per hour. However, more than 20,000 passengers were transported by a train per hour during peak times, said Jiang.

To ease overcrowding, an additional train would be put into operation during the Spring Festival next month, which meant trains could depart every 10 to 11 minutes.

Two more trains were expected to arrive next month and would be put into operation during the May Day holidays when the interval between trains could be shortened to eight minutes, he said.

Power failures on the Metro system disrupted subway services at the weekend.

The first disruption occurred on line one when a train was approaching Gangxia Station at about 2.30 p.m. Saturday. Services were resumed after a delay of about 42 minutes.

Another power failure on Sunday on line four disrupted trains for four hours.

Jiang said the incidents were not unusual on a new system.

"It is normal that some problems might be encountered on a new subway system. It is under control," said Jiang.

Editor: Catherine