Investigators will examine many possible causes of crash
As investigators sift through the wreckage of Metrolink 111 and the Union Pacific freight train it collided with Friday afternoon, they will look for clues that will help explain the failure of safety systems developed for decades to avert exactly this sort of disaster.
The accident took place in a hilly area where a single track, shared by both commuter and freight trains, descends along a curve approaching Metrolink's Chatsworth station.
Investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board will examine many possibilities, but the most immediate questions are these: Did a warning signal malfunction? Did crew members not notice a stop signal, or did an engineer fail to follow protocols designed to move trains safely through the area?
Tom Dinger, a retired Amtrak engineer, said the common practice is for northbound passenger trains to effectively pull over onto a side track at the Chatsworth station until southbound freight trains have passed. Between Chatsworth and Simi Valley there is only one set of tracks because of narrow tunnels that trains use to go beneath the Santa Susanna Pass.
"We were always stopped at Chatsworth to wait for the heavy UP [Union Pacific Railroad] trains to get off the hill," said Dinger, 64, of Silver Lake. "The UP train was almost at the siding -- it was less than a mile away. It's a shame."
Dinger said locomotive operators go no faster than 40 mph around the curve where Friday's crash took place. He speculated that the freight train was going no faster than 25 or 30 mph.
Dinger said the Metrolink engineer should have seen a trackside signal that would have warned him that a freight train was approaching. But because of the late-afternoon time of the crash, the engineer might not have seen that signal light because of the sun, Dinger said.
"I hope and pray he didn't overlook the signal," he said.
Steve Kulm, a spokesman for the Federal Railroad Administration, said there is no official protocol that dictates whether a passenger train or freight train has the right of way. He said it is up to local dispatchers.
Until Friday, Federal Railroad Administration statistics showed that 47 people had been killed in accidents involving Metrolink trains since 1999. That total includes three killed in a Placentia crash in 2002 and 11 in a Glendale accident in 2005 that at the time was the deadliest in Metrolink history. The other 33 deaths were caused either by people walking on tracks or collisions between trains and vehicles.
