My local news was at the scene. So far 5 dead and 6 critical.
GOD be with all of them, both the victims and the rescuers. This is tough stuff.
Horrible scene this morning. Looks like someone just picked it up and tossed it.
I always thought the Amfleets (based on late 1960s metroliners) were likely the safest option for HSR in the world given their apparent low center of gravity, sturdy construction, and stainless skin. Perhaps with 30 years of service, they’ve lost a bit of integrity? The condition of the first car is simply horrific.
Keep in mind, this was a one-train incident with no apparent collision…what would have happened if the train struck a parked or opposing train on a similar curve?
Does anyone know if the engine was in push mode with a cab car in the lead? It looks like one of the passenger car derailed and then hit something nasty, that’s why its so mangled. I was wondering if that might have been the lead cab car. Real mess and a tragedy.
This appeared to be drawn by one of the new Sprinter engines (disconnected about a car length from the rest of the wreck)… I dont believe they push-pull on Acela regional.
6 now confirmed dead. 140 hurt. Hopefully we will get a cause. For now 2 possibilities as to cause. Human failure, due to excessive speed or not complying with signal indication and track failure. Could be a 3rd as to sabotage. There are others but till drug test are complete we wait and see. Later RJD
Now they are saying that where it came off the rails speaks more to wheel/rail interface than to speed, as a cause of the crash. An educated guess, but still a guess. It will be months before they decide to blame the engineer. (http://largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-surprised.gif)Did I just say that out loud?
As the news indicated, it’s been seventy years since an accident at this same location. In the late seventies I rail fanned in this area, catching shots of GG1s in their twilight years. The curve is not a severe as what is shown in the news coverage photos. The camera makes it seem like a very sharp curve.
Well, that didn’t take long. Wall Street Journal reports that the train was doing 100 mph in a 50 mph zone. Wonder how they know, at this point? Did they have a cop with a radar gun on the payrole?
I guess the vaunted Positive Train Control failed.
Locomotive was a new ACS-64. The first of these new locos actually, #601.
107 mph is how fast its being reported at before derailing.
Looking and Listening to the news gave me pretty good clue. Also some one probably leaked the info from the speed tapes and black box. My 31 years pent as a rail investigator help to come up with a cause even tho there is a lot more info to be had yet. Why was the train speeding. Several factors available. Engineer asleep,distracted by text, missed signal or drugs. Maybe more. Later RJD
The photo below from yahoo news shows the entire scene. The first car (near the white crane) apparently hit one or two of the poles holding up the cantenary which caused most of the damage to the car. The engine appears not to even taken the first part of the curve and went straight off.
The estimate of the speed comes from analysis from a video camera just before the curve. I believe the speed limit in 80 well before the curve and 50 going into the curve. A speed of well over 100 would explain the crash. Why it was going so fast remains to be determined.
A very good set of photos can be found at the following link.
Stan
NTSB was the one that made the announcement of excessive speed. Speed limit prior to the curve was 70mph. Posted speed for curve was 50. Estimated speed of train 107mph at point of derailment. No mention of what actual posted speed limit on this line segment is. Later RJD
I thought Positive Train Control was supposed to prevent this sort of thing.
New type of locomotive, means new technology, means new problems, like non-functioning PCT. Let’s not hang the engineer before the facts are known.
Steve Featherkile said:
I thought Positive Train Control was supposed to prevent this sort of thing.
Yes it possibly would have. Unfortunately PTC was not in effect on this particular section of the North East Corridor.
Steve Featherkile said: Let’s not hang the engineer before the facts are known.
Ahh but it’s always the crews fault… (http://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-undecided.gif)The full NTSB report will be ready in 2-3 years from now and all but a few people will have forgotten about the wreck. In all of the reports, I haven’t read/heard anything about the engineer being alive or dead.
He is very much alive. He suffered a gash to his head and has with the police but refused to give a statement and left the police station with a lawyer.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/GMABig/amtrak-engineer-helm-derailed-train/story?id=31023810