Sep 15, 2008 10:19 am US/Pacific
Train Recordings Are Missing Verbal Safety Checks
Death Toll Reaches 25 In Chatsworth Metrolink Crash
LOS ANGELES (CBS) ―
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Authorities are done searching for victims in the wreckage of a Metrolink commuter train that collided head-on with a freight train on Sept. 12, 2008.
CBS
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A Metrolink and a freight train collided on a curved, "U-shaped" track in Chatsworth and at least 17 passengers were reported dead and more than 100 injured.
CBS
A Metrolink dispatcher tried to warn the engineer on train No. 111 that he had run a red light, it was reported Sunday.
At least 25 people were killed on the train, which left Union Station in downtown Los Angeles at 3:35 p.m. Friday and crashed head-on into a Union Pacific freight train shortly before 4:23 p.m. in Chatsworth.
Officials said that of the 225 people aboard, 25 died in the crash,134 were injured, and 44 critically.
A Metrolink spokeswoman Saturday took the unusual step of saying the agency was responsible for the crash because the engineer ran a red light and did not stop to let the freight train pass.
"We are deeply sorry and we are totally at a loss, this is a new situation for Metrolink," Denise Tyrrell said. "At this moment we must acknowledge that it was a Metrolink engineer that made the error that caused yesterday's accident."
When the Metrolink train went through the red light, it triggered an alarm at the dispatch center in Pomona and workers tried to warn the engineer, but the crash had apparently just taken place.
A teenager told CBS 2 reporter Kristine Lazar that he received a text message from the engineer, Robert Sanchez, one minute before the crash.
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Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger visited the crash site Saturday and tried to reassure commuters that train travel is safer than automobiles. He also expressed sympathy for the victims and their families.
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa also went to the crash site and called for more safety measures.
"It seems, to me anyway, that there needs to be some kind of failsafe secondary measure to protect against human error, because two trains on the same track is just unacceptable," the mayor said.
Villaraigosa asked clergy to have a moment of silence for the victims at religious services Sunday and visited some of the victims and their families at Providence Holy Cross Medical Center in Mission Hills.
The NTSB has taken over the investigation of the crash. Investigators have recovered data, audio and video event recorders from both trains, which could shed more light on the cause of the collision.
Federal investigators say audio recordings are missing required verbal safety checks between the engineer and the conductor in the seconds before the train collided with a freight engine.
Kitty Higgins, a board member for the National Transportation Safety Board, says the recordings show the engineer and conductor called out and confirmed light signals along the route, but the tapes are missing calls for the last two lights the train passed just before the fiery wreck.
She says the last communication was recorded as the train passed a flashing yellow light.
The audio record went silent as the train passed a solid yellow light and then a red signal, which indicated the approach of another engine.
Crews made temporary repairs to the track, and the Metrolink cars were removed from the crash site late Sunday afternoon.
Until the Metrolink track is repaired, a separate agency, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, announced plans to use a "bus bridge" around the crash scene starting Monday.
In the meantime, Metrolink s
pokeswoman Denise Tyrrell, who delivered a surprisingly swift announcement Saturday blaming the engineer driving a Metrolink commuter train for failing to stop at a red light and causing ahead-on crash, tells the Associated Press Monday that she has quit over comments made by the Metrolink board.
Tyrell says the resignation is the result of a statement read by board member Ron Roberts to a Los Angeles Times blogger Sunday that her announcement was "premature." The National Transportation Safety Board confirmed on Sunday that the engineer, who was killed in the crash, had failed to stop at the final red signal.
(© 2010 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
SLIDESHOW: Metrolink Crash
SLIDESHOW: Metrolink, Freight Train Derailment
CBS News Interactive: Train Disasters
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