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Vol. 82/No. 12 March 26, 2018
Bosses disregard for safety led to Washington
Amtrak derailment
BY EDWIN FRUIT
SEATTLE — Debate continues in Washington state over who is responsible
for the derailment of Amtrak’s maiden voyage over new track between
Tacoma and Portland, Oregon, that led to the death of three people and
injured dozens Dec. 18. While Amtrak bosses insinuate that the train’s
engineer was responsible, inadequate training, management’s hurry to get
the service going to generate income and the bosses’ disregard for
safety lay behind the disaster.
“There’s still a lot more that will come out concerning the derailment,”
John Hiatt, a former Burlington Northern Santa Fe engineer and 25-year
veteran railroad accident investigator for the Bremseth Law firm in
Minnesota, told the Militant. Hiatt lives in Washington and has talked
to Amtrak workers there about the accident. “A big concern is that the
engineer had only one trip on the throttle in the southbound direction
and that was at night.”
The National Transportation Safety Board released an interview with the
unnamed engineer. He said he had no reservation about his readiness to
make the run, that he had operated the equipment on three training runs
— one southbound and two going north. He said he knew there was a sharp
curve and speed reduction after milepost 18, but that he didn’t see the
sign.
He said the fact that there was a conductor training on the run on the
engine with him didn’t distract him. When he did see a sign posted 30
mph he jammed on the brake, but it was too late and the train derailed.
He was seriously injured in the accident.
Garrick Freeman, the training conductor on the engine, filed a lawsuit
against Amtrak Jan. 3. The suit said Amtrak violated the Federal
Employers’ Liability Act, which requires management to ensure a
workplace free of dangerous conditions. It also said Amtrak bosses
failed to adequately train its employees to operate trains safely on the
new route. Freeman also was injured in the derailment and spent the
month of January in a rehab facility.
Pennie Cottrell, a passenger on the train who suffered broken ribs, a
fractured clavicle and internal injuries, filed a lawsuit charging
Amtrak management with responsibility. They ran the train after
installing Positive Train Control, which can stop trains that fail to
slow down, the suit explains, but they didn’t make the system operational.
In response to the public outrage over the Amtrak derailment and deaths,
the state Senate Labor and Commerce Committee held hearings on rail
safety Feb. 22. A number of rail workers, members of the Sheet Metal,
Air, Rail and Transportation union, known at SMART, testified about
unsafe operations BNSF managers pressed on workers.
“I have operated an unsafe train, safely over territory,” former
engineer Lacy Rodriguez testified. “The reason that I and others have
done things like that is because of harassment from the railroad.”
Mark McGaffey, a conductor and a safety representative for the SMART
union, described a rescue of rail workers his crew had to make after
BNSF sent trains out into a blizzard, stranding one crew in a tunnel for
10 hours.
State Sen. Patty Kuderer, from Bellevue, responded to the testimony,
saying federal safety rules are stacked against workers, who can’t match
the money and power of the railroads.
“Their health and safety were threatened, their lives were put in
jeopardy for real,” she said. “That happened because of decisions made
by management at BNSF, and nobody’s taking responsibility for it.”
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