Palmetto - Train 89 Incident

I really feel bad for the Engineer in these situations. The accident with the backhoe and then the hitting of the pedestrian. Its gotta just be brutal for the Engineer.

I was told the pedestrian was an attempted suicide.

Figure on the Track Dept workers on that work site will be interviewed by NTSB,including the crew on
Loram's "Rail Vac" machine,most of this will center on the Backhoe operator and Foreman,and were they even aware
they were fouling the active track.

The congressman guessed that "something went terribly wrong." Really???

Lee

Hey man, those Congressmen are right up there with the news media in their knowledge of railroading practices.............

Does anyone remember when the Congressman from New York almost got sideswiped by an express train while holding a news conference at the edge of a station platform in Connecticut, I think it was?

We had a similar wreck on the Penn Central around the mid seventies. Tower operator at Lincoln ( Metuchen NJ ) took an order to place No. 3 track west of Lincoln to County tower ( New Brunswick NJ ) out of service as several Track machines were coming east. Dispatcher gave Lincoln a BDA order which required the tower operator to place a can over the westbound No. 3 track signal lever and then report the time the BDA was placed. This was then repeated by the DS, however the tower man for whatever reason gave a time but never physically placed the BDA over the switch levers and signal lever governing movements west on three track.

In a text book case the operator a County sent the track machines east on 3 track. The operator at Lincoln got busy with a freight that was setting off at Metuchen and got a call from Union tower the next tower east that a Metroliner was by the door and next up on 3 track. The operator at Lincoln as was done hundreds of times before reached over behind him and pulled up a signal for three west and forgot about it. Several minutes later the Met collided with the first eastbound track machine and all hell broke loose. The saving grace was the fact recent snow storms had shorted out the MU Metroliner fleet and many of the schedules were pulled by a GG-1 as was this train. I talked to the engineer a week later down in Philly and he said the track machine had no lights lit and the way the sun was hanging low in the windshields he and the fireman didn't realize they were on a collision course for a minute or two. I think they got down to about 50 mph when they struck the track machines. There were a few minor injures but no fatalities. Knew the tower man he was fired and never got back to the railroad. He had at the time 22 years service and was posting a train dispatcher's job on his relief days, a real shame to end a good career in that manner. Everyone involved slipped a bullet on that deal.

Believe that happened at Milford Conn and an Amtrak Hippo did the honors there.

matawanaberdeen wrote:I really feel bad for the Engineer in these situations. The accident with the backhoe and then the hitting of the pedestrian. Its gotta just be brutal for the Engineer.

Hitting anyone is traumatic for any transit vehicle operator. It took a few months of therapy for a MTA Maryland Light Rail operator to get back on the job after hitting a rather classic-looking car with an old confused retiree in it, after the retiree turned onto the tracks.

TRAINS newswire has insight that general circulation media does not:

http://trn.trains.com/news/news-wire/20 ... tto-update" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Fair Use (stretched a little - subscription content):

A source tells Trains News Wire that, at the time of the accident, track No. 2 had been taken out of service for track work.

“The gang had been fouling the other tracks at times and had received permission from the dispatcher to do so,” the source says. “Sunday morning, there was a shift change. The night foreman gave up all fouls (alerting train crews to the work), and the day shift foreman had not asked for any fouls.”

Yet the backhoe was fouling Track No. 3, an active track, when the accident occurred.

“We don’t know whether they thought they still had a foul or if they were just trying to make a quick move and got caught,” the source says of the workers using the backhoe. “In any case, the rules require the use of supplemental shunting devices (to trigger track-occupancy circuits) when equipment is used to foul a track for more than five minutes. No supplemental shunting devices were used.”.............So far, officials have yet to say what role, if any, Amtrak's Advanced Civil Speed Enforcement System played in the accident. The system would have detected shunting cables and marked the track occupied, if the crew used shunting cables correctly.

If fouled-track warnings still existed on dispatchers' panels, then there could be a weakness in the ACSES positive train control system, which is designed to accommodate such situations. Alternatively, if track supervisors removed the fouls Sunday morning, then responsibility for the accident would rest outside PTC. Amtrak recently finished installing ACSES between New York and Washington, D.C., as part of a safety-enhancing action following the May 2015 wreck of Amtrak Northeast Regional No. 188 north of Philadelphia.

“From what I understand, the backhoe was a contractor’s backhoe on the wrong track,” Quimby says. “There should have been an Amtrak liaison on site with the contractor to do safety briefings and training, to ensure proper location, and to handle or coordinate any problems as they might arise.”

“Somehow, it looks to me like somebody failed to follow established procedures. This looks like a classic miscommunication or misunderstanding,”..

Now what appears interesting is that the outside contractor, LORAM - the operator of the track machinery in the area is somehow involved even if the backhoe has been reported to have been operated by the deceased Amtrak employees. It appears that there is another donkey waiting to say "ouch" when the tail gets pinned on it.

Zeke wrote:We had a similar wreck on the Penn Central around the mid seventies. Tower operator at Lincoln ( Metuchen NJ ) took an order to place No. 3 track west of Lincoln to County tower ( New Brunswick NJ ) out of service as several Track machines were coming east. Dispatcher gave Lincoln a BDA order which required the tower operator to place a can over the westbound No. 3 track signal lever and then report the time the BDA was placed. This was then repeated by the DS, however the tower man for whatever reason gave a time but never physically placed the BDA over the switch levers and signal lever governing movements west on three track.

Although that doesn't seem to have been the case here, failure to use a blocking device, the NTSB has stated that on many busy Eastern railroads the requirement to use blocking devices was often ignored. It was also a factor in the head-on collision years ago between Amtrak and Conrail freight OPSE at Dobbs Ferry. No BDA. NTSB said the explanation was usually, "We're too busy."

We had a couple of posts, wondering about the engineer's point of view. I have
A question for actual engineers in this thread, "is there anything you can do
to increase your survival chances" in that last 8 seconds before a collision?

I guess also its SO MUCH different if you're in a separate engine unit,
versus in a cab in a MU lead car...

Gilbert B Norman wrote:

A source tells Trains News Wire that, at the time of the accident, track No. 2 had been taken out of service for track work.

Kinda seems like 4 track would have been the out of service portion from the pics... what with all the Loram equipment occupying it.

The LORAM ballast vac was on Track 2. Train and backhoe were on Track 3.

Jeff Smith wrote:http://www.foxbusiness.com/features/201 ... lment.html

Forbes Media Chairman Steve Forbes was traveling on that train and recounted his experiences.

“Our prayers go out to the families of those two workers who were killed and to those who were injured.” Forbes told the FOX Business Network’s Maria Bartiromo.

Forbes described what he felt when the derailment occurred.

“Fortunately I was in the last car of the train and we were between Philadelphia and Wilmington, going into Wilmington, and then suddenly you felt a sudden halt. It was like somebody in a car hitting the breaks, easing up and then hitting the breaks, but in a matter of seconds. And so you knew this was not a normal slowdown. So it came to a screeching halt, if you had coffee, the coffee was in the air, cups were flying but other than that we weren’t impacted.” said Forbes.

He continued, “There was initially the smell of rubber like the brakes were burning but that went away so we knew there was not a fire, so we just decided to sit there until we were told what to do. We weren’t going to get off at the potential live track next to us. First responders came in about a half an hour and said ‘is anyone injured?’ They were obviously working on the first two cars where you did have those injuries.”

I'm impressed by the fact that (apparently) Steve Forbes is a long-distance Amtrak rider.

Mr. Scoostraw, train 89, Palmetto, handles local passengers Ny-Wash. At Wash, something is done that Amtrak is loathe to do - cut cars at an intermediate station.

In this case not that big a deal; the local cars are on the head and they are cut with the engine change. That is why the V-Bag is placed on the rear, as was seen in various photos of the incident.