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Amtrak's "The Vermonter" was apparently involved in an incident today also. Somewhere in New York City near Penn Station----train caught fire, everybody evacuated. I can't find any other details other than what's posted on Trainorders.
amtrak92 Member # 14343
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DC's Metro had a collision today during rush hour.
train lady Member # 3920
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update on DC...nine dead and 70 injured. The wort accident in Metro history.
notelvis Member # 3071
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I hope that the DC Metro investigation doesn't yield a train operator in the middle of sending a text message.
MDRR Member # 2992
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notelvis- that is exactly what crossed my mind, and/or making a call on cell phone...
train lady Member # 3920
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that is the first thing that I thought of as well. Now they say the death total is 7 not 9.
Gilbert B Norman Member # 1541
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Gentlemen....before we speculate.
Please give my Rockford piece a read, or at least a scan.
train lady Member # 3920
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one thing noted in the Washington Post today is that this train should have been retired 3 years ago. Also the general manager said last night that the train was on automatic.But for the time being all will be run manually.
RRCHINA Member # 1514
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GBN, thank you for posting the ROCKFORD info. I too spent many years with a Class 1 and can appreciate the perspective you present.
Speculation now appears regularly in media 'news', both print and electronic, as they just want to get noticed rather than give us facrual information.
George Harris Member # 2077
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"Should have been retired 3 years ago?" Hogwash. That should not have been an issue.
IF on automatic, there is a much bigger problem than age. What happened to failsafe?
The last fatal accident they had, at Shady Grove due to ice on rails, was due to the train being in automatic after the driver begged to run on manual due to the stopping profile in the automatic not taking into account the rail conditions. That is from the NTSB report, not my opinion. At or before that time the train drivers were prohibited from running in manual without control center permission. So, the driver had to either lose his job for defying an order or risk his life by folloing instructions. He bet wrong and lost his life instead of his job.
I spent 6 years in the design and construction part, 1972-1978. The military expression "Too close to the flagpole" applies to a lot of things done there.
Geoff Mayo Member # 153
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Even in manual it is still supposed to be full supervisory mode - in simple terms, you can't do anything wrong as the system should prevent you doing so. Beyond that is going into speculation which I'm glad Mr Norman has this time decided against doing.
Interesting comments George, as always. Their history does seem to reflect as much.
Geoff M.
Dakguy201 Member # 10360
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The Sheriff of Winnebago County is now saying that one of his deputies reported to CN that water was washing over their tracks 20 minutes before the accident occured.
Geoff Mayo Member # 153
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"The National Transportation Safety Board said Thursday that the train control system lost detection of a test train that was stopped in the same place as the train that was struck on Monday."
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