The seven-car train was traveling at 82 miles per hour (132 km per
hour), nearly three times the speed limit for the curved section of
track where it crashed, investigators have said. The driver, William
Rockefeller, 46, applied the brakes five seconds before it derailed.
The crash also critically injured 11 people and snarled travel for
the roughly 26,000 regular commuters on the Metro-North Hudson line
that serves suburbs north of New York City.
On Tuesday, Rockefeller told National Transportation Safety Board
investigators that "he nodded. He zoned out," Anthony Bottalico, the
general chairman of the driver's labor union, the Association of
Commuter Rail Employees, told Reuters.
Rockefeller told investigators that "by the time he realized (what
was happening) it was almost into the curve," Bottalico said. "He
put the train into neutral and put the brakes on immediately. That's
what he acknowledged he did."
The NTSB has cautioned that its investigation would continue for
weeks, if not months, and it was far from reaching a conclusion on
the cause.
Alcohol tests on Rockefeller came back negative, NTSB member Earl
Weener told a news conference on Tuesday, adding the results of drug
tests were still pending.
The train might have benefited from a Positive Train Control (PTC)
system to stop or slow a speeding train, Weener said.
"For more than 20 years, the NTSB has recommended implementation" of
PTC, Weener said. "Since this is a derailment, it's possible that
PTC could have prevented it."
Railroad experts have been advocating for PTC systems for years, but
they are expensive and complicated and often incompatible for all
trains within a single transit system.
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which runs Metro-North,
said it began work to install Positive Train Control in 2009 with a
goal of implementing it by 2015. The authority said it has budgeted
nearly $600 million, with at least another $300 million needed, and
even then was unlikely to meet the 2015 deadline.
"I WAS IN A DAZE"
Apart from the equipment and technology, investigators are looking
at Rockefeller, a volunteer firefighter who was married two years
ago. The NTSB, which interviewed Rockefeller on Tuesday afternoon,
said it is focusing on all his activities in the 72 hours before the
crash, Weener said.
Rockefeller spent about two hours with NTSB investigators, said
Bottalico of the driver's labor union.
The NTSB said in a statement late on Tuesday evening, after
Bottalico's news interviews, that it had removed the Association of
Commuter Rail Employees from the investigation, citing a breach of
confidential information.
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Rockefeller had never been disciplined for job performance in his 10
years as a train driver, his union said.
Rockefeller has retained a defense lawyer, Jeffrey Chartier, who did
not respond to a request for comment.
One source involved in the ongoing investigation quoted Rockefeller
directly as having told investigators, "I was in a daze" in the
moments before the crash.
Asked whether Rockefeller dozed off, the source said, "It's more
like a highway hypnosis. You're looking straight ahead and you're
seeing rail and rail and rail, and you lose perspective."
A similar condition of temporary lapse of consciousness, known as
microsleep, was blamed for a 2008 Boston light rail crash that
killed the operator.
In 2003, assistant captain Richard Smith blacked out at the wheel of
the Staten Island ferry and crashed on docking, killing 11 people.
Smith pleaded guilty to negligent homicide and was sentenced to 18
months in prison.
Rockefeller could not fully recall what happened, except that at
some point he suddenly came out of the temporary daze, realized the
train was going too fast and into a dangerous curve, and applied the
brakes, said the law-enforcement source, who has access to official
reports on the investigation and requested anonymity.
"Look, it doesn't make what happened any better or anything, but
this is comparable to driving a car and looking at the white lines,
and sort of nodding off for a minute," Bottalico said.
If criminal charges are warranted, they would be brought by Bronx
District Attorney Robert Johnson, a spokesman for Johnson said.
"We think when final record is looked at, they'll realize there was
no criminal intent here," Bottalico said. "Speed was high, but it
was an accident."
[By Chris Francescani, Mark Hosenball and Curtis
Skinner]
(Reporting by Chris Francescani in New York, Mark Hosenball in
Washington and Curtis Skinner in Yonkers, New York; writing by
Daniel Trotta and Eric M. Johnson; editing by Gunna Dickson and Lisa
Shumaker)
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