Last Updated on September 29, 2016 by CCAR Staff
Q: What happened in New Jersey?
A: A commuter train, New Jersey Transit train No. 1614, bulldozed into the Hoboken Terminal station after crashing through an end-of-the-line barrier at 8:45 a.m. Thursday. A woman standing on the platform was killed and more than 100 others, mostly train passengers, were injured when the train slammed into the concourse.
Q: How did that happen?
A: The cause is under investigation. The train’s engineer was reportedly cooperating with investigators after being treated at a hospital and released Thursday.
Q: Is there technology to help prevent such accidents?
A: Yes. Such technology includes positive train control, a computerized safety system designed to automatically stop or slow trains moving in unauthorized ways, such as faster than speed limits or running red signals.
However, Southern California’s Metrolink spokeswoman Sherita Coffelt said it’s not certain if positive train control would have prevented the New Jersey accident because the cause is still unknown.
Q: Why didn’t that technology prevent this accident?
A: New Jersey’s Transit trains don’t have positive train control. All U.S. railroads had been ordered to install the system by the end of 2015, but regulators extended the deadline to the end of 2018 at railroads’ request.
Q: Have similar accidents happened here?
A: A Burlington Northern Santa Fe freight train crashed with a Metrolink train full of commuters in Placentia on April 23, 2002, after the freight train crew missed a yellow warning signal to slow the train, killing three people and injuring 162, the National Transportation Safety Board found.
A Metrolink train engineer and two dozen others were killed and 135 were hurt in Chatsworth on Sept. 12, 2008, when the engineer ran a red signal while texting train fans and the train crashed into a Union Pacific freight train.
The Chatsworth tragedy led Congress to pass legislation shortly after to require positive train control technology on all passenger lines by the end of 2015.
Q: What’s been done to prevent such accidents here?
A: Since 2015, all seven Metrolink lines — 91/Perris Valley, San Bernardino, Inland Empire-Orange County, Riverside, Orange County, Antelope Valley and Ventura — are equipped with positive train control.
Since 2008, Metrolink trains have been equipped with automatic train stop, which stops trains if engineers don’t respond to beeps from an audible alert system inside the engineer’s compartment by pushing a button and stopping the train themselves. That’s now a backup system to positive train control.
In Los Angeles County, Metro operates four light-rail lines and two subway lines, which are heavy rail like the New Jersey Transit train. Metro’s system and trains are installed with automatic train protection that slows trains approaching stations if the operator hasn’t already reduced excessive speed. The system can also help prevent train-versus-train collisions.
Automatic train protection doesn’t operate where Metro trains run on streets with regular traffic, due to the presence of vehicles and pedestrians. Operators are trained to be extra vigilant in those areas, which have special train signals for operators, dedicated traffic signals for motorists and active and passive signs for pedestrians.
Q: Could such an accident happen here again?
A: That’s difficult to say without knowing the cause of the New Jersey train crash, Metrolink’s Coffelt said.
Sources: Metro Executive Officer of Corporate Safety Vijay Ahawani, Metrolink spokeswoman Sherita Coffelt, wire services.
