Metro Collision, Washington DC

[madmax]

Originally Posted by naraht

The screw from the NTSB that studied the accident indicated that the Metro Driver's Cell phone was in her backpack, which is a perfectly acceptable place to have it according to the regulations.

The NTSB ran a test train to the location of the stopped train and the sensors in the track did not properly transmit that to the central computers. The moving train was running on automatic, which at that point the computer will run the train between 55 and 59 miles per hour. With the stopped train being invisible to the central computers, the computers would have not had any reason to reduce speed. The stopped train was around a slight curve, so it wouldn't have been seen a very long distance down the track. The moving train had both the manual and emergency brakes put on before the crash.

It is entirely possible that the driver of the moving train did everything that she was trained to do, and it still wasn't enough.

There are also issues that the paired cars in the front of the train were in the 1000 series (the cars that metro bought when the first started the system in the mid 1970s).

Are you sure the conducter could not see the first train? Trains don't exactly make sharp turns.

Even if the sensors were not working there still should not have been an accident. The trains are not totally automated and they have a driver in the train for that purpose.

At 55-60 mph and a 125 ft brake pattern, the driver did not apply the brakes until a second or two before impact.

If you are driving anything and you are going around a bend with a blind spot don't you slow down until you can see what is ahead of you?

[UGAalum94]

Originally Posted by madmax

Are you sure the conducter could not see the first train? Trains don't exactly make sharp turns.

Even if the sensors were not working there still should not have been an accident. The trains are not totally automated and they have a driver in the train for that purpose.

At 55-60 mph and a 125 ft brake pattern, the driver did not apply the brakes until a second or two before impact.

If you are driving anything and you are going around a bend with a blind spot don't you slow down until you can see what is ahead of you?

Why are you so invested in it being driver error?

[madmax]

Originally Posted by UGAalum94

Why are you so invested in it being driver error?

Probably because the train crashed, 9 people are dean and I think there is a good chance the driver was responsible.

Why are you so invested in the crash not being driver error?

[naraht]

Originally Posted by madmax

Probably because the train crashed, 9 people are dean and I think there is a good chance the driver was responsible.

Why are you so invested in the crash not being driver error?

What is your experience that gives you more insight into this than the people that the NTSB has investigating?

[UGAalum94]

Originally Posted by madmax

Probably because the train crashed, 9 people are dean and I think there is a good chance the driver was responsible.

Why are you so invested in the crash not being driver error?

I'm not. I haven't repeatedly posted in this thread making apparently unsubstantiated claims about the causes of the wreck.

Originally Posted by naraht

What is your experience that gives you more insight into this than the people that the NTSB has investigating?

Exactly.

[tri deezy]

DC locals are considering the train operator a hero right now. In DC, the metro operators rely on the computer system and their responsibility is to open the doors when the reach the stations and to announce the stations on the intercom. There's evidence that she administered the manual brake and the emergency brake, and her cell phone was safely zipped away in her backpack, following regulations. The Post is reporting that the computer's sensor in that track had not read the previous train, so the train that was stopped on the track was invisible to the computer on the train that crashed into it.

[unicorn]

Originally Posted by tri deezy

There's evidence that she administered the manual brake and the emergency brake, and her cell phone was safely zipped away in her backpack, following regulations. The Post is reporting that the computer's sensor in that track had not read the previous train, so the train that was stopped on the track was invisible to the computer on the train that crashed into it.

Here's a link supporting what tri deezy said: (Washington Post)

And another: (WashPost)

"When the investigation is completed, we will find she went beyond her job," Catoe said afterward. "I believe she saved lives. She was able to slow that train up before it crashed."

It's all so sad. She had a son in college, too. But props to her for trying to minimize the damage, even if the accident was unavoidable.

[madmax]

Originally Posted by tri deezy

DC locals are considering the train operator a hero right now. In DC, the metro operators rely on the computer system and their responsibility is to open the doors when the reach the stations and to announce the stations on the intercom. There's evidence that she administered the manual brake and the emergency brake, and her cell phone was safely zipped away in her backpack, following regulations. The Post is reporting that the computer's sensor in that track had not read the previous train, so the train that was stopped on the track was invisible to the computer on the train that crashed into it.

A hero? For what, hitting the brake too late? If the train was going 60 and the brakes were applied 125 ft before the crash then she only hit the brakes for a little over a second. If she was distracted and didn't hit the brake until a second before impact how does that make her a hero?

[naraht]

Originally Posted by madmax

Are you sure the conducter could not see the first train? Trains don't exactly make sharp turns.

Even if the sensors were not working there still should not have been an accident. The trains are not totally automated and they have a driver in the train for that purpose.

At 55-60 mph and a 125 ft brake pattern, the driver did not apply the brakes until a second or two before impact.

If you are driving anything and you are going around a bend with a blind spot don't you slow down until you can see what is ahead of you?

What makes you say that the trains aren't totally automated at that point? Yes, the drivers can advance the trains slightly after they get into the station and things like that, but while it is in Automatic mode the computer does the speedup and slow down between stations normally.

What makes you think that the train could be stopped from 55 MPH in 125 ft. A Semi can't be stopped in that distance and the Metro trains are heavier than that.

The Operators don't do any braking round the bends normally. In automatic operations, the train operators can sit on their hands from the moment that they get the doors closed until the train comes to a stop at the next station. About all the actually do in that mode is talk to the controllers and honk the horn.

Randy