Since the commuter rail system opened in 1992, 15 passengers have died on Metrolink trains in three separate accidents -- all of them involving trains being pushed from behind by a locomotive instead of being pulled.
Nationally, at least half a dozen horrific accidents, killing 38 passengers and injuring almost 1,000, have occurred in the last decade involving trains being pushed.
The widely accepted practice of pushing trains has gone on for decades in the commuter railroad industry, but since the deadly Jan. 26 crash of a Metrolink train in Glendale, it has come under intense new scrutiny. After long condoning the practice, federal regulators now say they are conducting a fresh review of the issue.
Putting heavy locomotives at the rear of a train, some experts say, leaves passengers much more vulnerable in frontal crashes and may be particularly risky along routes shared with freight trains and in dense urban settings with frequent grade crossings. At 130 to 150 tons, locomotives provide passengers a large and hefty buffer in accidents.
But putting the locomotives at the rear can make economic sense. By pulling trains one way and pushing the other, railroads avoid the costly and time-consuming practice of rearranging cars at the end of the line.
Some experts are reluctant to draw broad conclusions from the Glendale accident, noting that a confluence of highly improbable factors -- everything from the split-second timing of trains to the size of an engine block inside a 1992 Jeep Cherokee astride the tracks -- transformed what might have been a nonfatal crash into a multi-train wreck that killed 11 people and injured 180 others.
"After decades in the railroad industry, I have only seen one other case where three trains were involved in a single accident, and those were all freight trains," said Paul Bodner, a Florida rail safety consultant and former federal railroad investigator. "This Glendale accident will never happen again. It was as remote as hitting the lottery."
Other experts dispute that view. They say the accident reinforces concerns about the safety of pushing passenger trains with a locomotive in the rear, as was done on the southbound Metrolink No. 100, the first to crash and derail in Glendale.
In push mode, the train is controlled from a cab car, which is a passenger coach at the front of the train with an engineer's station. Some commuters refer to them derisively as "coffin cars."
