NTSB Wants Changes in Track Protection

The National Transportation Safety Board wants Amtrak and the Federal Railroad Administration to ban the practice of using watchmen to notify track worker of approaching trains in areas where positive train control offers additional safety features.

The recommendation was included in an NTSB report about an April 24, 2018, accident in which an Amtrak watchman was killed in Bowie, Maryland, when he was struck from behind by a northbound Amtrak train while focused on the movement of a southbound MARC commuter train.

The report said the probable cause of the accident was “Amtrak’s insufficient site-specific safety work plan for the Bowie project that (1) did not consider the multiple main tracks in a high-noise environment and (2) did not provide the rail gang watchman with a safe place to stand,” leading to him standing on an active track.

NTSB noted in its report that PTC systems can automatically slow trains through work zones.

NTSB Wants Restricted Speed for Trains Passing Through Territory in Which Signal System Has Been Suspended

The National Transportation Safety Board has asked the Federal Railroad Administration to issue an emergency order directing that trains or locomotives move at restricted speed when passing through territory on which the signal system has been suspended and a switch has been reported realigned for a main track.

The recommendation came following a Feb. 4 head-on collision between Amtrak’s Silver Star and a parked CSX auto rack train, resulting in two Amtrak crew members being killed.

Preliminary NTSB findings are that a misaligned switch routed the passenger train into the path of the freight train, near Cayce, South Carolina.

CSX personnel had turned off the signal system on the territory where the crash occurred in order to install updated traffic control system components for the implementation of positive train control.

That meant dispatchers were using track warrants to govern train movements through the work territory.

The accident was similar to one that occurred on March 14, 2016 in Granger, Wyoming.

The NTSB said safe movement of trains in the event of a signal system suspension hinges upon proper switch alignment.

In the case of the accidents that occurred in Wyoming and South Carolina, the switch alignment relied on error-free manual work, which was not safeguarded by either technology or supervision.

“The installation of the life-saving positive train control technology on the CSX tracks is not the cause of the Cayce, South Carolina, train collision,” said NTSB Chairman Robert Sumwalt in a statement. “While the collision remains under investigation, we know that signal suspensions are an unusual operating condition, used for signal maintenance, repair and installation that have the potential to increase the risk of train collisions. That risk was not mitigated in the Cayce collision. Our recommendation, if implemented, works to mitigate that increased risk.”

NTSB Wants Screening for Sleep Disorders

The National Transportation Safety Board wants the Federal Railroad Administration to require railroads to medically screen “safety-sensitive” employees for sleep disorders.

The recommendation came in a special investigation report about two end-of-track collisions at commuter train stations in New Jersey and New York.

In a separate report, the NTSB said last week that both accidents, which involved commuter railroads in the New York City area, were caused by engineer fatigue resulting from undiagnosed and untreated obstructive sleep apnea.

In both accidents trains struck end-of-track bumping posts and continued into the waiting rooms of the stations.

In a news release, the MTSB said both incidents had “almost identical” probable causes and safety issues.

The NTSB also called for the use of technology such as positive train control in terminal stations and improving the effectiveness of system safety program plans to improve terminal operations.

The New Jersey accident, which occurred on Sept. 29, 2016, and involved a New Jersey Transit train in Hoboken, killed one person and injured 110.

The other accident involved the Long Island Rail Road and occurred on Jan. 4, 2017, at the Atlantic Terminal in Brooklyn, New York. That incident injured 108.

Rail Related Deaths Rose in 2016

The National Transportation Safety Board reported that 733 people were killed in 2016 in railroad related accidents, an increase from the 708 who died in 2015.

Most of the fatalities, 487,  involved people trespassing on railroad property.

Total transportation-related fatalities in 2016 were also up by 2,030 over 2015.

Highway accidents claimed the lives of 95 percent of the 39,339 who died last year.

“Unfortunately, we continue to see increases in transportation fatalities,” said NTSB Chairman Robert Sumwalt. “We can do more, we must do more, to eliminate the completely preventable accidents that claim so many lives each year.”

He called for implementation of the 315 open safety recommendations related to the agency’s most wanted list of transportation safety improvements

The list includes such recommendations as reducing fatigue-related accidents and improving transit-rail safety oversight.

Sumwalt Named as NTSB Vice Chairman

The Trump administration has named Robert L. Sumwalt as vice chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board.

President Donald Trump said he plans to nominate Sumwalt for another five-year term on the board.

Sunwalt will replace as vice chairman Bella Dinh-Zarr, whose duties in that position  ended this week.

Dinh-Varr had served as acting chairman since March 16 and remains a board member.

The NTSB has five members, all of whom are nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate to serve five-year terms.

The NTSB also said that it was 50 years ago this week that it conducted its first investigation, a probe of a plane crash at Lexington, Kentucky, on April 3, 1967.

The board has since issued more than 2,400 safety recommendations for railroads, more than 200 recommendations in intermodal transportation, and several thousand additional recommendations for other modes of transportation.