On the evening of April 24th, an Amtrak worker in the midst of a work assignment fell victim to a fast-moving train and a failure by the crew to follow certain safety procedures. The incident occurred just five months after the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) strongly suggested Amtrak adopt the policy of slowing their trains in the presence of work crews—advice they did not heed.
The recommendation came as a result of a detailed report that followed a similar accident which happened in 2016. In April of that year an Amtrak train traveling through Chester, Pennsylvania, just outside of Philadelphia, struck a construction vehicle while traveling at 106 mph—killing two members of the work crew before derailing and injuring 37 passengers in the process. The ensuing NTSB investigation pointed the proverbial finger at Amtrak—blaming a lax safety culture and pressures of maintaining a schedule as the primary reasons for the collision. “Amtrak’s safety culture is failing, and is primed to fail again, until and unless Amtrak changes the way it practices safety management,” stated NTSB Chairman Robert Sumwalt at a hearing that reviewed the board’s findings.
Fast forward to 2018, when an Amtrak watchman in Bowie, Maryland was struck by a fast-moving train—ironically—while monitoring the safety of track workers doing repairs. Again, such situations are in opposition to the recommendations of the NTSB, which stated that all Amtrak trains should reduce speed when traveling through work zones. While the investigation into the latest death has just begun, The NTSB will try to determine how much of a factor the train’s speed played in the collision. According to Gus Ubaldi, an engineering consultant on railroad and airport safety, there is certainly the suggestion that “…there was a breakdown in the extensive safety procedures required to protect [Amtrak workers].”
Unfortunately, these aren’t the only safety breaches experienced by Amtrak in recent months. There have been numerous fatalities involving Amtrak incidents since December 2017, a severely lacking safety record that I discussed in detail with a related blog post in April. According to the Federal Railroad Administration, the number of fatalities involving a moving Amtrak train has risen from 119 in 2008 to 170 in 2017—including several passengers killed during a derailment in December that occurred on the inaugural run of a new route in Washington State.
So what exactly is Amtrak doing to improve their dismal safety record? “The company needs to take bold action, possibly even pause operations,” stated Brian Fielkow—author of Leading People Safely. The comment followed another incident in February 2018 that killed two rail workers, indicating that the accidents of 2017 were not isolated. Currently, there’s little doubt that our national passenger rail carrier is going downhill in regards to respecting the sanctity of individual lives and the safety of both employees and passengers—hopefully 2018 is the year that Amtrak can turn the trend around and bring back safe rail travel.
