Amtrak ordered to take rail safety steps after crash
WASHINGTON (Reuters) — Amtrak must take immediate steps to improve the safety of its busiest route after a derailment in Philadelphia this week that killed eight passengers and sent more than 200 to local hospitals, US federal regulators said on Saturday.
The Federal Railroad Administration ordered Amtrak to put a speed-control system in use on all northbound trains along the stretch where a train crashed Tuesday night as it headed to New York.
The system, called automatic train control (ATC), is already in use on southbound trains near the derailment site.
“These are just initial steps, but we believe they will immediately improve safety for passengers on the Northeast Corridor,” FRA acting Administrator Sarah Feinberg said in a news release.
Amtrak said in a statement it would implement the FRA’s directives immediately.
Feinberg added that the most important safety step will be full implementation of positive train control, a more robust system for avoiding accidents than ATC.
Robert Sumwalt, a member of the Na- tional Transportation Safety Board, the agency conducting the federal probe, said this week positive train control would have prevented the accident if it was in operation along that stretch of track.
Under current law, the rail industry must adopt the technology by the end of this year.
The ill-fated train was barreling north at more than twice the 50-mile-per-hour speed limit when it entered a sharp curve and derailed, leaving a trail of tangled metal and human carnage alongside the track.
ATC detects when a train is traveling above the speed limit, sending a signal to the engineer. If the operator fails to act, the system will automatically apply the brakes.