Mattress fire causes Metro-North Railroad delays

New York City firefighters extinguished a mattress on the tracks of the Metro-North New Haven Line that delayed trains for more than an hour Thursday afternoon in the Bronx, N.Y., according to FDNY spokesman and firefighter Tommy Schwaber.

http://www.newstimes.com/news/article/M ... to-4877506" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Noting these passengers milling around on what appears to be active tracks in a very busy area, I wonder if they'd have been much safer just sitting on the train. Is this SOP?

Because firefighters were also on the tracks the lines were probably not active. I believe FDNY will not go onto the ROW unless they know there are 1) no trains operating and 2) the power is shutoff.

That being the case, and because of past events, the passengers were probably allowed to leave the train because of the high temperatures and the power being shutdown.

I was a little surprised too at first, especially given the description the passengers were "milling around" on the ROW. Even with no trains running the tracks are not an especially safe place to be. However, then I noticed there are police officers on the platform and the riders are climbing up to it. So I think what we're seeing here is an evacuation.

I give MNR some credit. Passengers don't want to be forced to sit on trains with no a/c and ventilation in high temperatures. Railroaders don't like non-railroaders on the ROW. Happily they seem to have modified their previous position.

If it was me, given the possibility of a lengthy delay, I would access that platform and keep right on going! To the nearest subway.

The caption of the photos on the linked site said that the fire was in the rear car not the ROW, so it's understandable that passengers would self evacuate. There are obviously no locks on emergency exits and windows, so if someone dumped the train and went out the windows or doors what else can the train crew do? Call out emergency and try to stop all traffic and power. Possibly the fire started in the mattress inside the train and they stopped the train and threw the mattress out? Perhaps parts of the interior caught fire as well, thus causing people to self evacuate. If there was a fire on the tracks only why would people jump onto the tracks, thereby into the fire?

Information seems sketchy at this point to say the least.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBdCtqlc3rQ" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3EDX6GgFts" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Searched Youtube to see if anything was up on this, found these - clearly the evac was from a Harlem line M7a - so not really anything inherently to do with the New Haven line aside from the trackage at that point being shared by the Harlen and New Haven Lines.

Fact checking is not that hard to do. If it is on trackage that serves two lines, it isn't hard to say it delayed both those lines instead of just one of them.

I know sometimes information can be a little sketchy, in need of updating if news breaks, but this seems like the facts reporting was a bit shoddy. >_<

WPIX was also claiming it was a New Haven line train, so it's not just the News Times neglecting to fact check!

Another side of the story... http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Fi ... 89221.html

It seems the mattress under the train caught fire and then people panicked and self evacuated. FDNY told people to stay on the train, obviously they didn't listen. It takes a lot longer to die from heat stroke or dehydration than it does from electrocution or being struck by a train. However, when people panic reasoning ability suffers drastically. As you can see MNR and FDNY evacuated people to the street and platform NOT the tracks. It just makes everything more complicated when people panic. All the evacuation posters on MNR trains state 1) contact train crew and 2) remain inside the train.

I've been in a couple of occurrences where we had to evacuate trains due to fire. Thankfully all the passengers were very cooperative in those incidents and no one was injured. It makes it very difficult when you're 2 or 3 train crew members responsible for the lives of hundreds of people in a situation like that and people don't listen to instructions.

Waiting for official statement from MNR, have yet to find one. If someone does please link to it.

Also for your reading pleasure... http://www.mta.info/mta/pdf/railsafety.pdf So at least let's all be well informed.

Believe it was train 9629 that was involved.. not a NHV train.

RearOfSignal wrote: ....
I've been in a couple of occurrences where we had to evacuate trains due to fire. Thankfully all the passengers were very cooperative in those incidents and no one was injured. It makes it very difficult when you're 2 or 3 train crew members responsible for the lives of hundreds of people in a situation like that and people don't listen to instructions.

...

Yes I can imagine, hundreds of passengers, a handful of crew members, very difficult to control. And all it takes in that kind of an incident is a couple of people to spark a stampede.

The train stopped very close to the Tremont station, in the Park Avenue cut, a bad location for as many years as I can remember. In this link -- click here -- from Bronx TV 12 there is a video report from the scene not long after the incident and while FDNY was still there.

I was on one of the trains that got held up near Woodlawn
They reversed us to Mount Vernon East
Then we headed southbound so the train crew that I was with was really good at keeping the passengers informed