https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/am ... on-n830751

I don't like this. I live on the other coast. I'm hoping all of you beautiful bastards are okay. Some twitter people are calling this a mass casualty event.

My prayers are up.

Haven't heard any casualty reports yet. Still trying to get I-5 open for now.

sutz wrote:Haven't heard any casualty reports yet. Still trying to get I-5 open for now.

Only one I've seen is from Tom Winter/NBC on twitter. The mass casualty stuff was speculation, so I don't want to pass that as fact.

Ribbon cutting friday for a new route, which is this one. First day of service for Cascades route this AM. Trains on ground across I-5, Sheriff mentioned casualties. I-5 expected to be effected for several days per State patrol PIO lady.

This is a conglomeration of local NBC and Fox networks. I have inverted the Fox info for Sutz and The Three Amigos so as to get a truer picture for them. Some Brit commentator on Fox says 70 souls on board and Casualties are involved per sheriff. K5 reports 70 souls also.

Amtrak spent $800m to celebrate this new route, debris on the rails BEFORE the derailment per commentators.

I wonder how much of the $800m went to track improvement??? I have doubts.

Awful news.

Hope everyone is OK.

They are claiming the tracks were upgraded for the higher speeds. Inspectors are being brought in to figure out what happened exactly. Really sucks for the people involved.

KOMO feeding Fox News - Pierce Sheriff summarizing. Reporters asked to get off of the on-ramps. Multiple cars out of camera range ostensibly crushed by following cars. Sounding yuck.

Reporting rail cars at 18mpg at the curve over I-5. 18mpg is nuttin'. I've seen debris on tracks at slow speeds in my youth and it's typically uneventful. YMMV

Now reporting 80mph. I love the media.

Locomotive has an event controller like an airplane "black box". Now reporting "multiple fatalities" from KOMO

Apparently the mayor of Lakewood was paet of a bid to stop this new route, citing safety issues with the tracks being to close to cars and pedestrians with the train travelling to fast.

I know it's fun to bash the media and all, but the initial reports on events like this are seldom comprehensive or accurate.



It'll take weeks to sort it all out.

sutz wrote:It'll take weeks to sort it all out.

So true. 90% of "fake news" is really someone rushing to get the story rather than getting the facts first.
The race to get the scoop is the driving factor, along with {censored} of course.

Reading that there are at least 6 dead. Awful news.

My son loves his trains as he was overjoyed when he saw a video of a Washington based Amtrak train with the Seahawks logo on it.

Latest news said 6 confirmed dead, with more expected. I imagine they haven't reached all the autos/trucks yet. "Scores" injured. The Lakewood mayor was specifically talking about high-speed trains crossing the city streets, not out in the country where this happened. I dunno, the Amtrack goes through Sumner and Puyallup without slowing down and the only people that ever get hurt are the ones that use it as a suicide method.

You'd think they would have tried out the tracks with an empty train first.

This new route had "improved" tracks to accomodate faster trains. I thought I read something about complaints that there were too tight of turns on the route but it looks like where it derailed was relatively straight.

XxXdragonXxX wrote:This new route had "improved" tracks to accomodate faster trains. I thought I read something about complaints that there were too tight of turns on the route but it looks like where it derailed was relatively straight.

There is a corner there, but not particularly sharp. I certainly wouldn't call it "relatively straight". The tracks make a bend to go from paralleling the freeway to crossing it at an angle.

Sounds like a combination of driver error and poor engineering. Why design a 30 mph max curve on a high speed route?

81 MPH seems pretty damn fast for an 'S' like that.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/47%C2 ... 5?hl=en-US

Very sad to hear of this awful tragedy.

Was on a Thalys high speed train in October, from Amsterdam to Paris, which only took three hours at speeds of up to 300km/h (~180mph). Magnificent service, but I did briefly wonder how large a brown smear everyone would be at a derailment at those speeds. It was amazing - the cars on freeways, when paralleling the train, seemed like they were going backwards!

Amtrak is so liable at this point, it's crazy.

Why aren't computers in charge of trains?...

RolandDeschain wrote:Amtrak is so liable at this point, it's crazy.

Why aren't computers in charge of trains?...

They are in Europe, and they were suppose to be in the US by 2015, but our wonderful DOT delayed the mandate that all trains be equipped with the same safety (like a governor on a golf cart) equipment that they use in Europe to prevent trains going too fast and/or off the tracks.

Even worse these new Amtrak trains ARE equipped with the safety features, but they weren't being used at the time yesterday..........because they didn't have to yet until 2018, which is when the rules go into effect.

Sgt. Largent wrote:

RolandDeschain wrote:Amtrak is so liable at this point, it's crazy.

Why aren't computers in charge of trains?...

They are in Europe, and they were suppose to be in the US by 2015, but our wonderful DOT delayed the mandate that all trains be equipped with the same safety (like a governor on a golf cart) equipment that they use in Europe to prevent trains going too fast and/or off the tracks.

Even worse these new Amtrak trains ARE equipped with the safety features, but they weren't being used at the time yesterday..........because they didn't have to yet until 2018, which is when the rules go into effect.

The tracks are equipped with the ATC tech, the trains were not. They were scheduled to be installed in Q2 of 2018.

The Lakewood mayor made a comment before it opened to the effect of, and I’m paraphrasing, the benefit of adding this new line was very very limited for commuters and the real beneficiaries of its completion were the bureaucrats who could put it on their resume.