Excessive Speed Probed as Factor in Fatal Philadelphia Train Wreck

WSJ.com ^ | 05/13/2015 | TED MANN, Biography @TMannWSJ ted.mann Google+ Ted.Mann@wsj.com ANDREW TANGEL and KRIS MAHER

[Fresh Wind]

Driving that train
High on cocaine...

[dead]

From Amtrak's website:

Northeast Corridor: The 363 miles of the 456-mile corridor connecting Washington, Philadelphia, New York and Boston, the busiest passenger line in the country, with trains regularly reaching speeds of 125 - 150 mph (201 - 241 kph).

[Ditter]

I just learned that the daughter of a friend was badly injured in that train wreck. Say a prayer for Geralyns recovery.

[SeaHawkFan]

Maybe AMTRACK should teach its engineers Newton’s 1st law of inertia.

There is a reason it is called “A LAW”!!!

[SeaHawkFan]

After this criminally negligent behavior by the operator of this train, the railroads can kiss off any chance they might have had on an extension.

[JenB]

It ought to be a lot simpler to engineer driverless trains than it is to do driverless cars or trucks that are currently all the rage.

Simpler? Yup. Simple? No. They've been working on this for years - well over a decade. Various PTC solutions are being rolled out. I don't know much about the system Amtrak uses but I have worked on other PTC solutions. It's incredibly difficult to get right. For one thing, you essentially have to get FRA approval for the way you've handled each mile of track.

But if you notice almost all the deadly train crashes in recent years come down to drivers not paying attention and going too fast or running into other trains. This is a solvable problem, one that is in the process of being solved. There are a lot of people who will be looking at this incident and determining if the current solutions could have prevented it, believe me.

[fatima]

Prayers ((((Hugs))))

[Grams A]

Hey Ditter - Happy to offer up a prayer. We have our women’s weekly prayer group this afternoon and will also add Geralyn’s name to the list.

[Ditter]

Thank you Grams.

[Vaquero]

hmmmmm....... I doubt there is an Amtrack train capable of reaching 100 mph

It's not the train.....it's the tracks that are antiquated

[slickdain]

welcome to the new world!

Acela Express trains are the fastest trainsets in the Americas; the highest speed they attain is 150 mph (240 km/h) in revenue service.

[slickdain]

oh right. just like i can’t drive 150 on 65 mph interstates. is this stupid day or am i on the wrong website.

[Vaquero]

It must be stupid day I guess . Those tracks are not capable of high speed travel around curves. These are not high speed systems. The train is probably capable of plenty of speed on the straights.

[Alberta's Child]

The other issue though, is these things arrive and depart at stations on a timetable . . . very rarely do they deviate from that.

Is this a joke? LOL. Seems like Amtrak hasn't run a train on time for years.

[Alberta's Child]

It has nothing to do with disciplinary action by the railroad. The crash site is being treated as a crime scene now.

It's a safe bet that human error is the one and only relevant contributing factor in this crash.

[Alberta's Child]

Amtrak runs Acela trains on this line and regularly exceeds 130 mph on some parts of the line.

[MrB]

Rahm Emanuel is out there already claiming it was because of lack of spending.

I say it’s the liberals’ fault for squandering $22 trillion on wealth transfers with no effect on poverty.

[Alberta's Child]

I am very familiar (professionally) with the issues surrounding the automatic train safety systems under the Federal mandate. The "good" news in this case is that this incident involved the government-run Amtrak. It's the private freight railroads that are pushing for the extension.

And they ARE going to get the extension, whether Congress likes it or not. The locomotive manufacturing industry simply does not have the capacity to meet their customers' requirements under the Federal mandate. Everyone in the industry knew that mandate was a joke when it was passed.

[Alberta's Child]

I would expect nothing less from that @sshole. He’s nothing but an anus with a full set of teeth.

[bert]

OK..... that may be true.

My experience on Amtrack is that there is generally not able to exceed 60 or so.

On my trip back from Seattle to Syracuse last year it was 0 mph because they had cancellation after cancellation and I ended up flying