Train derailment caused by speed
Posted Mar 1, 2012 11:59 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Investigators say a Via Rail passenger train that derailed while switching tracks was going too fast.
Last Sunday’s derailment killed three engineers and injured 45 passengers.
The Transportation Safety Board says the train was travelling at almost 108 kilometres when it derailed west of Toronto.
The speed limit while changing tracks is 24 kilometres — meaning the train was going more than four times faster than it should have been.
Lead investigator Tom Griffith says while they know the excess speed caused the derailment, it’s not the end of the investigation.
He says they need to understand the environment in which the crew was operating and why they made the decisions they did.
Griffith says the train’s black box also shows the brakes were not applied before the crash.
He says they don’t know if the track signals were working at 100 per cent — but there’s no indication the signals were malfunctioning.
Griffith says the train’s black box is key in the probe — it records the train’s speed, brake pressure, when the brakes were applied, and whether the whistle was blowing.
But it does not record voice.
Griffith says the lack of an onboard voice recording will make the investigation more challenging.
He says once again, they are urging Transport Canada and the railway industry to make sure that voice recorders are installed on all Canadian trains.
