Discussion for article #236337
Why isnt this shit automated? Oh, the GOTP refuses to pay for upgrades?
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wait for them to heap blame on the conductor
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Whoa nelly. And those trains were built in the 70’s I heard on the news this morning. If this proves to be an avoidable tragedy, expects heads to roll.
We really need to get our infrastructure up to par with the rest of the world however. Its an embarrassment of riches to have so much money in the country hoarded by the .01% that pay next to nothing in taxes, and a Republican Congress that refuses to spend a dime on any improvements for the last 6 years. Republicans are determined to kill off Amtrak and the Postal Service and put both their services in the hands of greedy privateers.
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Check the engineers Twitter account.
I’ll bet it says something like: “Hey, man, I just had dinner and it was…OH SHIT!..”
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I was a certified rail road conductor for 17 years. The conductor is in charge of the train. It is his job to make sure that other crew members - including the engineer- follow the rules.
I don’t know what sort of mechanical train control devices were employed here but I do know that there would have been a speed limit on this curve that both the engineer and conductor were responsible for following.
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Well, actually there is a national standard currently being implemented by all Class I railroads, called “Positive Train Control”, which would allow automated and semi-automated control over some phases of freight rail traffic. I work in the industry (on the IT side, but not directly on PTC implementation) and you might be surprised at how difficult it is to automate the operation of a mainline train. It’s not quite the same as your airport shuttle train which operates in a tightly-controlled, closed loop or A-B-A-B oscillation. Amtrak operates over private rail lines owned by different companies, with switching and signaling evolved over a couple of hundred years. They are likely at least as far away (looking like 2017 or later) from having PTC as the Class I’s are. I’m not actually certain Amtrak is covered by the PTC regulations; passenger rail is not my area.
The GOTP deserves plenty of derision for slashing the Amtrak budget, but that likely is not a significant contributor to the lack of automated passenger train control. It is an extremely complex technical challenge, money or no.
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Was this an Acela?
No. I hear the Acela’s actually lean into bends allowing them to take turns faster though.
Amtrak trains top-speed is about 135mph, Acela is 150mph.
If true, this appears to be nothing more than human error and a senseless tragedy.
I can only hope that the Engineer is not guilty of making this worse by being distracted doing something as stupid as using an electronic device.
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icymi - This is the technology that might have prevented Tuesday’s Amtrak disaster
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Same thing happened a little over a year ago when a Metro-North train heading into Manhattan hit a (IIRC) 35-mph curve at over 80. Turns out that the engineer admitted to just zoning out, although sleep deprivation caused by changing shifts may have contributed.
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A lot of people think just throwing money at something solves a problem. As you say, logistics can at times be very complex, especially in the US. Indeed we need more money for Amtrak, and the GOP always fight it. But anyone can point to any incident and say “see, this technology could have saved it”. It’s not always that easy.
The blame here appears to go to those running the train. I say “appears” because an investigation is obviously required and might yield other info (malfunction, etc.). But at this point “operator error” sure looks likely.
Indeed – that would be the photo they used with this article. Lazy, TPM… Lazy!
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Well, at this point it sure looks that way. And if that is that case, they should. If not, they should not.
You’re right. I didn’t even notice the first time.
The engineer drives the train. The conductor only collects tickets. Except I can’t believe this is the first time the train has gone that fast on the turn before. Perhaps something wrong with the tracks
Let us hope
Calling for automation is ridiculous. As the engineer upstream stated, it’s difficult to do. Better to ensure that the train operator was well trained, and that the route is clear and understood. Was the engineer on double shifts? Was there a status change on this route? Stuff like that… However, like the captain of the Costra Concordia (which went aground doing some bogus manuveur in Italy), I expect that the engineer will either be heavily fined or will do jail time.
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Or Obama!!!