Amtrak derailment in Tacoma - multiple fatalities

[zerocool84]

How we allow the train companies to keep delaying the automatic braking is beyond me. That must have lots of lobbying money.

 

[Puffnstuff]

I'm not buying it if I'm honest and I think there's far more to this story that has not yet been revealed. People were harmed and all involved must be held accountable for their actions. If the engineer knew that he was 3 miles from a reduced speed section and that he was traveling 50mph over that speed limit don't you think its reasonable to assume that he'd have begun reducing his speed at that point?

The only experience I have with trains, apart from being a passenger and playing with HO scale toys, is running the train simulator 2018 on steam but even in that game you have to pay attention to the grade and speed limit signs along with your tonnage. Each time this happens it begs that PTC be installed without further delays to prevent this from ever happening again. One life is worth more than the cost of the system in my mind plus it tattles on the vehicle in real time so if a dispatcher sees something amiss they can contact the consist directly.

 

[JSt0rm]

I'm not buying it if I'm honest and I think there's far more to this story that has not yet been revealed. People were harmed and all involved must be held accountable for their actions. If the engineer knew that he was 3 miles from a reduced speed section and that he was traveling 50mph over that speed limit don't you think its reasonable to assume that he'd have begun reducing his speed at that point?

The only experience I have with trains, apart from being a passenger and playing with HO scale toys, is running the train simulator 2018 on steam but even in that game you have to pay attention to the grade and speed limit signs along with your tonnage. Each time this happens it begs that PTC be installed without further delays to prevent this from ever happening again. One life is worth more than the cost of the system in my mind plus it tattles on the vehicle in real time so if a dispatcher sees something amiss they can contact the consist directly.

 

[Jhhnn]

I'm not buying it if I'm honest and I think there's far more to this story that has not yet been revealed. People were harmed and all involved must be held accountable for their actions. If the engineer knew that he was 3 miles from a reduced speed section and that he was traveling 50mph over that speed limit don't you think its reasonable to assume that he'd have begun reducing his speed at that point?

The only experience I have with trains, apart from being a passenger and playing with HO scale toys, is running the train simulator 2018 on steam but even in that game you have to pay attention to the grade and speed limit signs along with your tonnage. Each time this happens it begs that PTC be installed without further delays to prevent this from ever happening again. One life is worth more than the cost of the system in my mind plus it tattles on the vehicle in real time so if a dispatcher sees something amiss they can contact the consist directly.

Rail transit was my business for 20 years. A mile is more than enough distance to comfortably reduce speed from 80 to 30 mph with that kind of equipment. It could probably come to a complete stop in less than a quarter of that distance. It's not like a freight train. The reason properties run w/o the kind of protections you envision is that they're quite expensive & difficult to get working right because the vendors are all low bid & management higher ups are technologically inept. It took us years to get a simple block signaling train stop system to work reliably enough that we could actually use it.

 

[Brainonska511]

How we allow the train companies to keep delaying the automatic braking is beyond me. That must have lots of lobbying money.

For Amtrak, it's been mostly an unfunded mandate - "perform these upgrades, but don't cut money-losing routes, and we aren't going to give you more money to do it."

 

[interchange]

How hard would it be to make a cell-phone app that sets off a loud alarm when you are going at a dangerous speed? Even without PTC, adding some protection beyond human vigilance is just so easy.

 

[Puffnstuff]

The brits came up with automatic braking decades ago and it was a simple mechanism installed between the rails to put it into emergency if it was over speed. If the FRA is going to let them slide on the PTC they should at least have auto braking on the most dangerous accident prone places like this curve.

The engineer said he never saw the sign...have you guys ever seen some of the track side signs they use? They need highway sized signs like "hey dumbass slow down to xx mph now before you put it on the ground!" or other meaningful messages large enough for everyone to see. Maybe even put flashing lights on them if the train is approaching too fast just like state DOT's do at dangerous curves and they could adapt the gate crossing motion sensors for it.