Second Ave. Sagas

At least four dead in Hudson Line MNR derailment

Written by

Benjamin Kabak

in

A Metro-North derailment north of Spuyten Duyvil has led to four fatalities so far. (Photo courtesy of Ray Martin)

Four passengers have died and over 60 others are injured this morning after a Grand Central-bound Hudson Line Metro-North train derailed near the Spuyten Duyvil station in the Bronx. The train had left Poughkeepsie at 5:54 and was not scheduled to stop at Spuyten Duyvil. Yet, approximately 100 yards north of the station, five of the seven cars jumped the tracks. The lead car stopped just short of the Harlem River, and other cars were on their sides.

The MTA does not know what caused the derailment, and the agency will conduct “a detailed investigation,” according to a spokesman. According to NBC New York, the curve north of the Spuyten Duyvil station is a “slow-speed area,” but one eyewitness who rides that route regularly told NBC’s Michael Gargiulo that the train was moving fast. MTA officials said they will consult the train’s black box for speed records as part of the investigation.

For now, all Metro-North service on the Hudson Line is suspended between Tarrytown and Grand Central, and Amtrak’s Empire Line Service between New York City and Albany has been suspended as well. Metro-North will be providing shuttle bus service between White Plains and Tarrytown beginning at 11 a.m., and the Harlem Line will cross-honor Hudson Line tickets. There is no current timetable for service restoration.

I’ll have more as this story develops. It has not been a good year for Metro-North as this is the second passenger train derailment in six months. The previous incident was not a fatal one.

Comments

29 responses to “At least four dead in Hudson Line MNR derailment”

  1. Patrick @ The LIRR Today

    Thoughts and best wishes to everyone harmed in the derailment. According to the governor, the engineer is okay, but injured.

    Hopefully we find out more information soon.
    ~ Patrick

    Reply
    1. SEAN

      Same here.

      Reply
  2. Chet

    Hope all who were injured recover quickly. What a terrible accident…thankfully it wasn’t a morning rush hour when I would imagine there would be a lot more passengers on board.

    I do have question- From what I’ve seen, the train’s locomotive is a diesel engine at the back of the cars pushing the train set down the tracks. This segment of track is not electrified? If so, why not? Wouldn’t it be much safer to have it electrified and the engine up front?

    Reply
    1. capt subway

      The track is electrified, DC third rail. But the train originated at Poughkeepsie, well north of the end of the electrified territory, which only reaches to Croton North. So hence the train was of the diesel push/pull variety. I believe MNR, like the LIRR, has dual power locomotives, which operate on the diesel engine in non electrified territory and off the 3rd rail on electrified track. Can’t tell from the photos which model is involved here.

      Initial reports from some passengers noted what appeared to be excessive speed around the curve. I was under the impression MNR had ASC (automatic speed control) on its lines. The technology, or similar technologies, have been around for over 100 years. The NY subways, as well as many other subways/metros, have speed control time signals on most dangerous curves to prevent the train from being run in excess of the allowable speed.

      Reply
      1. SEAN

        Not sure if the push pulls have PTC, but I think the self propelled trains do. Can someone please verify?

        Reply
        1. Patrick @ The LIRR Today

          The M8’s were delivered ACES-ready, however none of the tracks and wayside systems needed for PTC are in place yet, so there is no PTC in use on MNCR at the current time.

          Reply
      2. Patrick @ The LIRR Today

        MNCR uses Maxi-Bomb (a dual-mode P32AC-DM and 7 Bombardier coaches) sets almost exclusively for through service from POU into GCT.

        Metro-North’s engines are fitted out with ASC, however they only enforce MAS, not temporary or permanent speed restrictions, which is commonly the case in curves. However, the MAS is set at 30mph and it’s not considered a speed restriction around this curve, so ASC presumably would have caused a penalty break application if it was (a) functioning properly and (b) the train was actually overspend.

        PTC would eventually be installed and enforce every type of speed restriction proactively: MAS, permanent speed restrictions, and temporary and very temporary speed restrictions.

        Reply
    2. Duke

      The engine is up front… on the northbound trip. But since there’s no way to physically turn the train around at Poughkeepsie, it’s behind on the southbound trip. This is typical operation and there really isn’t anything less safe about a locomotive pushing instead of pulling. Take a curve too fast and the train will derail either way.

      On that note, reports are saying five cars jumped the tracks, but if you look through the pictures, the entire train is completely off the tracks. The back end of it just fared a bit better and is less out of place.

      Isn’t positive train control supposed to prevent this sort of thing? I know Metro-North is working on implementing that.

      Reply
      1. D. Graham

        But the problem with what you’re saying relating to PTC is what has been going on all day. Everyone is speculating instead of waiting to see what the NTSB finds. The main assumption seems to be engineer error when we don’t even have a factual download from the black boxes to confirm the train was moving in excess speed and if it was if any attempt was made to slow it down anywhere between Tarrytown and the scene of the accident.

        Reply
        1. SEAN

          Correct, but a lot of this relates to the way news gets covered now a days. As an example, look at the recent event at Garden State Plaza – 99% of the coverage was speculation by the press or those being interviewed & it was almost all WRONG. Plus once there’s a story like this, it’s the only thing focused on & as a result, the story gets stretched beyond what it needs to be.

          Reply
          1. Alon Levy

            On the other hand, when the Spanish high-speed train crashed, railfans managed to accurately find its speed (which was far higher than permitted on the segment, which was just beyond the boundary between high-speed PTC-equipped territory and lower-speed unequipped territory) from analyzing a video of the train in motion.

            Reply
  3. Phantom

    I imagine that the Amtrak trains to Albany can be temporarily rerouted over the Hell Gate Bridge?

    There would be east/west track connections in Bronx/ Westchester that would lead to/from the normal path?

    Reply
    1. Alon Levy

      They can’t, there is no such connection. There’s an east-west connection much farther north, but it is out of service and before it was out of service its top speed was 5 mph.

      And before anyone suggests redundancy for the future, let me point out that the cost of maintaining such a line just for redundancy is quite high, and there’s no replacement for spending money on PTC to make sure such accidents do not happen.

      Reply
      1. Phantom

        Would it be possible to run those trains into Grand Central in the interim?

        Reply
        1. Alon Levy

          No, why would they? The accident was on a Grand Central-bound train. When Empire trains served Grand Central, they followed the Hudson Line route to Poughkeepsie. The accident was on the curve at the junction between Penn- and Grand Central-bound trains.

          Reply
        2. Phantom

          Via a connection to the Harlem Line, perhaps?

          Reply
          1. SEAN

            I believe the connection your thinking of is the loop track near Yankee stadium for clipper service, wich is of no benefit in this situation.

            Reply
            1. Phantom

              I just vaguely thought that there would be more connections available in a service beginning up north.

              Thanks Alon for that link to the info on the Beacon Line, which I hadn’t known of.

              Glad that MN and Amtrak have restored Amtrak service so quickly.

              Reply
      2. Aaron Burger

        Do you think it would be silly to put the Beacon Line back into revenue service? They could run a few trains a day during peak hours, cover a few stations that don’t traditionally see service, and use it as a redundant connection for both Amtrak and MNR.

        Reply
        1. Alon Levy

          The redundancy benefit is very small, since if accidents happen, people are still going to die and get injured, service is still going to be disrupted, etc.

          As a regional rail line, I’m not sure how useful it is: west of Brewster it’s really circuitous, and it would require a rebuild at a few million dollars per km anyway since the current state of the track is so poor.

          Between Brewster and Danbury it’s more interesting, though. They could build short connectors to let trains run Wassaic-Southeast-Danbury-Norwalk. With somewhat more difficulty trains could run the other way, i.e. White Plains-Danbury.

          Reply
        2. Bolwerk

          I could see putting it back in service as something like River Line, but I doubt there is any way in hell to justify bringing it up to MNRR standards.

          Beacon is generally a rural, grade crossing-riddled, single-tracked line that intersects some towns (“villages” in NYS parlance) and small cities.

          Reply
    2. Patrick @ The LIRR Today

      There is a possible alternate routing from ALB to NYP via Springfield MA and New Haven, using the route the Boston Section of the Lake Shore Limited uses from Albany to Springfield then down the route of the Northeast Regional‘s NHHS line into New Haven then down into Penn Station like normally.

      However, that route is much longer and CSX probably won’t go for it.

      But service does seem to have been returned at this hour.

      Reply
      1. Alon Levy

        Yeah, the derailment was just south of the junction rather than just north of it. Amtrak presumably was just steering clear of the area for a few hours so that they could do preliminary investigations and work around the junction, and also make sure the tracks are actually unobstructed.

        Reply
  4. Jerrold

    This is hardly the main issue here, but just imagine how crowded the #1 trains will be tomorrow, both morning and evening.

    Reply
    1. Alon Levy

      Is it actually going to be the case? The accident was north of Marble Hill, so they can’t connect Hudson Line trains to the 1. Maybe there will be shuttle buses to Van Cortlandt Park, but it seems unlikely to me – they’ll probably send the shuttle buses to the Harlem Line instead. The Hudson Line’s ridership is mostly long-distance, so it’s faster to go cross-county and connect to the Harlem Line than to ride a bus for 40 km into the city.

      Reply
      1. SEAN

        Trains will run as far south as Tarrytown. Shuttle busses will go to White Plains for further travel. Hudson Line ticketts are being excepted on Harlem Line trains.

        For those who live in Yonkers or town of Greenburgh, there are plenty of station options- even if crowding conditions exist. If possible, Bee-Line busses maybe an option to reach the train. http://www.beelinebus.com 914-813-7777

        Reply
        1. ajedrez

          For starters, my condolences go out to the relatives of those who were killed.

          In any case, aren’t Hudson Line tickets always cross-honored in any case? (As long as they’re within the corresponding zones). And the Bee Line site was changed. This is the new one: http://transportation.westches…..;Itemid=88

          Reply
    2. Patrick @ The LIRR Today

      The service plan for Monday involves train service to Yonkers then bus service to the (1) train at Van Cortlandt Park.

      They will offer 2 extra TPH on the (1) tomorrow to ease the loads.

      Reply
  5. lawhawk

    Thoughts and prayers go out to all those affected by the derailment. The engineer was injured, but apparently able to talk to investigators. Investigators will also look at the speed of the train and examine the black box to determine cause.

    There are reports indicating that there was a mechanical failure with the brakes. That’s something that may show u with the black boxes – that there was an indication that the engineer called for the brakes to activate, but didn’t.

    Reply

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