Amtrak Michigan: Wolverine, Blue Water, Pere Marquette

JimBoylan wrote:

ThirdRail7 wrote:

JimBoylan wrote:Other posts on the Group have claimed that many railroads (Union Pacific, for example) always fire the employees that were involved in an accident. Then, their union representative may demand a hearing to try to get their jobs back. The railroad may only allow evidence from locomotive cameras at the hearing if it shows the employee to be at fault. But, in this case, the National Transportation Safety Board got the pictures away from Amtrak.

There was no hearing. Typically, crews are removed from service after accidents and are medically disqualified until the results of post accident D&A tests are available. In a situation like this, the investigation would show there was no crew culpability (unless they messed up on something else earlier in the trip) and they would be put back into service.

The investigation after the accident would show that the signal was working properly and could NOT display Clear while the switch was lined for the siding. The jumper wires had been removed by that time. The only proof the engineer had to show that he was operating on a Clear signal against a diverging switch was the recording in Amtrak's camera. If the NTSB hadn't got possession of it, would the engineer have been allowed to use that evidence to show the impossible, an apparent false Clear signal, which happened because a Supervisor had tampered with some wires? Ordinarily, when a railroad has a choice between a Supervisor and an engineer, who gets fired?
At Chatsworth, Calif., the Conductor testified that the Engineer had a green signal, but investigation afterwards showed that should not have happened, and the dead Engineer on the cell phone was blamed for the accident.

The NTSB doesn't hold investigations for individual employees. They hold investigations against instances. To my knowledge, the NTSB can not hold someone out of service, nor can they fire someone. As previously indicated, the trains have cameras, witronix, gps and the signals are recorded. It didn't take time to see the preliminary cause which is why I made the cryptic response in the early stages of the thread. The "he said-she said" game is almost a thing of the past. There is too much information out there. It is just a matter of processing it and that doesn't take a great deal of time.

The only thing the train crew would have need to worry about is if they did something wrong prior to the incident that showed up in the investigation. The incident itself was cut and dry: The train had the signal and the crew responded appropriately. The investigation centered around "why" they had the signal.

While I'm happy the NTSB did a thorough investigation, I'm surprised it took so long in this case to publish the results. It shouldn't take a year to discover the facts they found from willing participants and witnesses.

How would you feel if a police detective took so long to investigate an obvious shut and dry murder case? The Dallas police had Oswald in custody and booked before midnight, and the press was fully informed.

electricron wrote:While I'm happy the NTSB did a thorough investigation, I'm surprised it took so long in this case to publish the results. It shouldn't take a year to discover the facts they found from willing participants and witnesses.

How would you feel if a police detective took so long to investigate an obvious shut and dry murder case? The Dallas police had Oswald in custody and booked before midnight, and the press was fully informed.

And he was killed the next day and we have conspiracy theories to this day.

Perhaps a more thorough investigation might have been in order.

Greg Moore wrote:

electricron wrote: Perhaps a more thorough investigation might have been in order.

It shouldn't take a year to find out that the maintenance field supervisor tricked the safety system while troubleshooting. And it shouldn't take a year to troubleshooting and fix the original failure at that signal.

It's easy to believe that federal employees are more concerned with make work and racking up hours than actually solving problems and getting their work done efficiently.

electricron wrote:

Greg Moore wrote:

electricron wrote: Perhaps a more thorough investigation might have been in order.

It shouldn't take a year to find out that the maintenance field supervisor tricked the safety system while troubleshooting. And it shouldn't take a year to troubleshooting and fix the original failure at that signal.

It's easy to believe that federal employees are more concerned with make work and racking up hours than actually solving problems and getting their work done efficiently.

Says the person who bases their safety opinions on what happens on his model railroad. Did you even read the report? If you did, you'll notice the bulk of the investigation was completed and NTSB made their recommendations to the appropriate agencies within 5 months.

Besides, why are you concerned about time? Didn't you say investigations should be thorough? Didn't you say safety should be number one?

I'm pretty sure you did:

Re: Amtrak may detour into GCT - 11/25

Postby electricron » Fri Nov 27, 2009 2:14 pm
I'm not going to blame Amtrak for having a maintenance car on the tracks.

I think railroads accept derailments too easily. A well ran railroad should have zero derailments. I don't accept derailments on my model train layout, I don't think railroads should in the real world.

I doubt there will be an investigation as detailed by the NTSB if the crane car had been a passenger car, and a few passengers were killed or injured. Every accident should be investigated that seriously, no matter the costs; if safety is really number one!

electricron

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Joined: Tue Aug 25, 2009 9:35 pm

Re: Amtrak may detour into GCT - 11/25

Postby electricron » Fri Nov 27, 2009 10:31 pm

The Metropolitan wrote:Further, I can't believe a model railroad that has never had a derailment. Every one I've witnessed has experienced them with a regularity that would make even the sloppiest railroad blush.

True. But that doesn't mean I should accept any derailments. I work constantly trying to prevent them.

I bet there's no safety or root cause investigation following this incident like there should be if safety is really number one .

electricron

Posts: 2149
Joined: Tue Aug 25, 2009 9:35 pm

Re: Amtrak may detour into GCT - 11/25

Postby electricron » Sat Nov 28, 2009 3:48 pm
See what I mean, no concern about safety at all from many of you.

NEC crane derailment, no casualities. Russia derailment, 26 casualties.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091128/ap_ ... n_derailed" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


It's not a laughing matter! Safety should always be the number one concern of Amtrak. If it isn't, Amtrak should pull up stakes and go away FOREVER!

So summarize, I'm not sure how long it takes you to investigate the actions of the employees that run your model railroad operation, but it takes a little more time in the field. As such, since as you stated three times "Safety should always be the number one concern," I see no reason why you should comment o nthe length of time it may take to make sure an accident like this does not repeat itself.

Unless....


Unless you weren't really concerned about safety in the previous posts and all you wanted to do was complain about the crane.

So, which is it? Should things be seriously investigated no matter the costs or will that be considered making work to rake in the hours?

While you contemplate a response, I'll leave you with is age old saying...that will ultimately get deleted or end up in the NJT transit forum:

electricron wrote:

Greg Moore wrote:

electricron wrote: Perhaps a more thorough investigation might have been in order.

It shouldn't take a year to find out that the maintenance field supervisor tricked the safety system while troubleshooting. And it shouldn't take a year to troubleshooting and fix the original failure at that signal.

It didn't. A good estimate on a full NTSB report is a year but results and safety recommendations come out much quicker than that ... often within days. The original failure of the switch (the signals worked fine until bypassed) is not the responsibility of the NTSB. Getting the switch aligned correctly is something that at absolute worst might take hours, not a year.

electricron wrote:It's easy to believe that federal employees are more concerned with make work and racking up hours than actually solving problems and getting their work done efficiently.

It is easy to not read an NTSB report and stick with wild guesses. Just because you believe something does not make it true. The NTSB strives to be accurate as well as efficient.

justalurker66 wrote:[
It didn't. A good estimate on a full NTSB report is a year but results and safety recommendations come out much quicker than that ... often within days. The original failure of the switch (the signals worked fine until bypassed) is not the responsibility of the NTSB. Getting the switch aligned correctly is something that at absolute worst might take hours, not a year.

Let's review, results of some investigations and safety recommendations were issued within a few days, weeks, or a month! The full and final report takes almost a full year! Why did it take a year to release the final report that the public can read for this investigation? The public deserves better!

electricron wrote:Let's review, results of some investigations and safety recommendations were issued within a few days, weeks, or a month! The full and final report takes almost a full year! Why did it take a year to release the final report that the public can read for this investigation? The public deserves better!

Already answered. I'm sure if you were running the NTSB full reports would be out within minutes - case closed, move on, cut the investigations short and don't do a good job of being accurate. Fortunately you're not running the NTSB and the reports are of much higher quality.

Anything safety critical the NTSB will say as quickly as they can responsibly say.

My opinion is the final report is done well before it's released. There is most likely a typical "government style" review procedure that sends it to the legal staffs of various departments or agencies before it's released.

It took almost four years for the accident report on the NJT 7277 Sideswipe to come out,so count your blessings

lirr42 wrote:It took almost four years for the accident report on the NJT 7277 Sideswipe to come out,so count your blessings

That is nonsense. It would be nice to stick with reality here.

South Jersey Budd wrote:My opinion is the final report is done well before it's released. There is most likely a typical "government style" review procedure that sends it to the legal staffs of various departments or agencies before it's released.

If you had any idea the testing and modeling that goes into an investigation you'd realize that when they are done, they release, after being checked over for typos and the like of course.

What they usually do, is carefully rule out non-causes till you get to the event or item or thing or chain of events items or things that concluded in the incident. They check all kinds of records, do materials testing, computer modeling and simulations, talk to suppliers, talk to OEM, talk to experts that know relevant things, and take int account the witness testimony, and if available, event recorders or other electronic records. Sometimes it's cut and dry like the MNRR derail (clearly an unintentional overspeed), but when a signal and a switch have conflicting info.... that's going to take a bit more digging.


Now, i just hope changes are made so that this close call can never happen again. How about we let the experts figure it out, and stop with the conspiracies and "oh em gee the government is the devil and delays reports" malarkey.

I do have an idea and I know the reports are very thorough and quite extensive and therefore do take some time to complete but I am also sure that legal staffs will do the final thorough review of the entire report before it's released. I don't think they should come out immediately but in a reasonable amount of time.

justalurker66 wrote:

ThirdRail7 wrote:This is about safety. This is about something that has been suspected before. This is about the supposedly perfect signal system that has cost people their lives and livelihoods. For too many years, I've heard "I had the signal!" only to have those investigating argue against that statement by saying the switch was against you, so it is impossible or what you described is impossible, the system won't allow that, we'll watch it for 24 hours blah blah blah.

Congratulations. You have *ONE* incident where the camera survived and the signal was wrong. It does not absolve any of the crews who have in the past NOT had the signal nor the next crew that is involved in an incident that is their fault. But have joy that you can probably blame this incident on a different union.

I personally wish you'd remained just a lurker. What kind of thing is that to say? The issue is that this sort of thing happens, crews claim it happens, and the fact that it happens is a safety risk. To catch it happening is excellent as there's an actual test case, and no one got killed. And where there's one, there are many more. This doesn't absolve anyone, but it opens the door for others to have been right too, and actually arriving at the truth is a positive step, period. You can't improve things if you don't even understand the reality.

electricron wrote:It's easy to believe that federal employees are more concerned with make work and racking up hours than actually solving problems and getting their work done efficiently.

That is only easy to believe if you don't know what you're talking about, and is an unsupported statement. The NTSB's record is not in question here.

ryanov wrote:I personally wish you'd remained just a lurker.

I could say the same ... perhaps if you would have been involved in our conversation 13 months ago you would have understood the post better.

Everyone wants to blame someone else. How about we have everyone work together to clean up their own messes and avoid incidents instead of being overjoyed that it was some other union that messed up? There should be no joy in finding out it was just another railroad employee's error.