Railway Track & Structures - November 2008 - (Page 8)

I N D U S T R Y T O D AY None of the 412 passengers on board train 905 were injured during the 2:42 p.m. incident, in which the front wheels of the third car of the train slid off the tracks and dragged for 2,300 feet before the train stopped. Corrective action was taken with the inspector following the incident, and he is currently being retrained to be able to return to his duties as a track inspector. “Our inspector failed to recognize the out-of-tolerance rail conditions,” according to Metro’s Chief Safety Officer Ronald Keele. “The track conditions compounded with the forces of the moving train caused one wheel to climb atop one track and the other wheel to drop to the ground. We are very fortunate that there were no injuries.” The findings of Metro’s internal investigation determined that the track inspector failed to detect “defects in the track’s geometry” in the area of the derailment and “violated several inspection procedures,” according to Keele. The inspector did not inform the Operations Control Center of dangerous track conditions, did not report any dangerous or defective conditions to his supervisor and failed to properly measure the space between the two tracks. Following the June derailment, Metro’s Department of Track, Structures and System Maintenance implemented a new Track Inspector Certification Program in which track inspectors perform both a written and practical examination. That new certification program is now mandatory for all current and new track inspectors. Metro employs 37 track inspectors and has 11 vacancies. All completed the new certification program by mid-October. Metro’s Track Department has since purchased a new piece of track equipment called a lightweight track loading fixture to measure the lateral forces on its tracks. It also has placed an order for a customized “rail geometry vehicle,” scheduled to arrive in 2010, that will be able to identify when the track geometry or alignment is off, including whether the rails are spread too far apart. This new piece of equipment can replicate conditions of a fully-loaded train of passengers, something that the lightweight fixture cannot do. 8 Railway Track & Structures November 2008 www.rtands.com http://www.rtands.com

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Railway Track and Structures Contents On Track Industry Today Supplier News AREMA News NRC News TTCI R&D TrainingVvital in Shaping Future of Railroad Industry Switch Stands, Switch Machines Automation Offers Improvements in M/W Planning AREMA 2008 Conference Report Products and Literature People Calendar Advertisers Index Sales Representatives Website Directory Professional Directory Classified Advertising Chicago Perspective

Railway Track & Structures - November 2008

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