Here's a big surprise,
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Norfolk Southern wiped out most of video leading up to East Palestine derailment
by Darrel RowlandFri, March 24th 2023, 8:17 AM CDT
COLUMBUS, Ohio (WSYX) — Norfolk Southern wiped out most of a video in the train cab that could have provided crucial information about the East Palestine derailment, the head of the agency investigating the crash says.
While the camera in the locomotive has 12 hours of recording time, “all of that – except 15 minutes before the derailment and 5 minutes after – was overwritten after the accident because they put the locomotive immediately back in service,” Jennifer L. Homendy, chair of the National Transportation Safety Board, told ABC 6 On Your Side.
That means everything except for those 20 minutes around the derailment was recorded over. And thus investigators cannot check video from the inward-facing camera to see what the three-person train crew was doing earlier in the trip.
Jennifer Homendy, chair of the National Transportation Safety Board, testifies Wednesday before the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee. (screenshot)
“It’s just as important to see what was going on before that,” Homendy said. “The train was going in the 35-40 mph range earlier and then between 40-50. So we don’t even have what was occurring around the first and second wayside (defect) detectors, much less before that, all of which is key to investigations.”
The detectors, placed at intervals several miles apart along the tracks, are designed to pick up problems such as the overheated bearing blamed for causing the wreck.
The preliminary NTSB report said the crew was not at fault.
Six on Your Side reached out to Homendy after the missing recording came up briefly Wednesday during a three-and-a-half hearing on the Feb. 3 wreck in eastern Ohio that is still drawing national attention.
The transportation board leader said her agency plans to hold an investigative field hearing in East Palestine in June.
“The hearing will be wholly fact-finding in nature and open to the public,” she said.
Before the hearing, the NTSB will hold a town hall to receive public comments.
Unlike flight recorders on airplanes or even videoes on Amtrak or commuter rail lines,
no requirement exists to preserve recordings on freight trains – even ones that derail and cause untold damage.
The problem is not new – even in Ohio. Lack of video hampered investigators probing Aug. 12, 2019, a collision between two CSX trains in the northwest Ohio community of Carey – one of which started its trip in Columbus.
The NTSB initially recommended mandatory "crash- and fire-protected" cameras in 2010 and repeated the request numerous times in the 13 years since, Homendy said in written testimony to the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee.
“Like cockpit voice recorders in aviation, audio and video recorders in the locomotive cab are essential for helping investigators determine the cause of an accident and make more precise safety recommendations. Recorders also help operators proactively improve their safety policies and practices,” she said during Wednesday’s hearing.
“Now is the time to expand that requirement to audio and include the Class 1 freight railroads in that mandate.”
Wayside defect detector in northern Columbus. (WSYX)
Homendy said the NTSB also is taking a close look at the wayside defect detectors - often dubbed "hot boxes."
Thirty miles west of East Palestine, near Sebring, a set of detectors picked up the overheating wheel bearing that the NTSB suspects caused the derailment. It was 38 degrees hotter than the surrounding air temperature.
Another detector in Salem, about 20 miles from the crash site, showed the bearing’s temperature had skyrocketed by 65 degrees in just those 10 miles.
By then, the bearing’s temperature was 103 degrees hotter than the surrounding air. But here’s the catch: Norfolk Southern’s standards don’t call for the train to be stopped and inspected until the bearing reaches at least 115 degrees above the outside temperature – a mere 12 degrees hotter than the reading.
But the time the next reading in East Palestine showed the bearing a stunning 253 degrees above the air temperature, the crew attempted to stop the train - but it was too late.
Norfolk Southern CEO Alan Shaw testified that railroad employees adhered to company guidelines - which he called among the strictest in the industry - on when the train must be stopped.
Norfolk Southern CEO Alan Shaw testifies Wednesday before the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee in Washington. (Screenshot)
Two issues are now getting a closer look.
One is that the crew operating the train apparently didn't get a warning of the overheating rail bearing until it hit the critical level just before the derailment. Instead, only Norfolk Southern's operations center in Atlanta was able to see the earlier temperature readings.
The other: Why the train wasn't stopped when the reading showed the bearing's temperature was rising so rapidly?
"The desk in Atlanta has trending technology software. We are investigating what that software showed the desk employee and what was going on there at the time," Homendy told WSYX.
Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, top Republican on the Senate Commerce Committee, questions a witness during Wednesday's hearing on the East Palestine train wreck. (Screenshot)
During the hearing, Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, the top Republican on the panel, took note of the rapidly rising temperature of the bearing 20 miles from the crash site as he questioned Shaw.
"If you'd stopped then it would have prevented the derailment," Cruz remarked.
Shaw noted the company already has agreed to add 200 hot boxes to its 22-state rail network, part of 1,000 additional devices the rail industry has agreed to install after the Ohio crash.
Ian Jefferies, CEO of the Association of American Railroads, testifies Wednesday in front of the Senate Commerce Committee. (Screenshot)
Ian Jefferies, president and CEO of the Association of American Railroads, said rail companies are "looking at industry best practices to examine and potentially adopt new algorithms for trending detection. So that if there is a dramatic spike in temperature, even though it may be below that absolute threshold, it's caught. And so we brought the entire industry together and over the next month we'll be reporting out, OK, what can we learn from each other? And what are the best practices we can adopt and what other steps need to be taken based on the information we have and the predictive analytics we can put into place? "
Homendy said her agency is "going to look at the spacing of those detectors, whether the information is or should be monitored in real-time with data trending from a control center. And we will look at the temperature thresholds which indicate immediate action once an overheated bearing is detected."
Several times during Wednesday's session, the statements of rail industry leaders were challenged by Clyde Whitaker, state legislative director for the transportation division of the Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation union,
He said on-board train crews should be notified of trending information, such as the rapidly heating bearing in the train that derailed in eastern Ohio.
"We need to be notified whenever these trending detectors are seeing this car trend hotter. That way we can keep a better eye on it - or even stop inspecting that rail car," Whitaker said.
Instead, train companies want to keep their trains moving even if possible problems are spotted, he testified.
"Several days after East Palestine we almost had a similar incident in the Cleveland area on Norfolk Southern," Whitaker told the senators.
"The train dispatcher (in Atlanta) came on and said, 'Hey, we have a report on the trending defect detector on the train. We need you to stop and inspect it.'
"Immediately after that, the chief dispatcher - which is the person that controls the whole railroad - told them to keep going."
How did the crew discover there was a problem?
A train going the opposite direction on a parallel track radioed and said, "Hey, your trains on fire. Wow, stop your train," Whitaker testified.
Ohio state Sen. Stephanie Kunze, R-Dublin. (screenshot)
Meanwhile, the Ohio Senate approved a transportation bill Thursday with several rail safety provisions:
Requiring at least a two-person crew, which Whitaker and others say is vital to safety.
Installing hot boxes every 10 to 15 miles, based on terrain.
Requiring the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio to study and submit a report within 90 days regarding best practices for hot boxes and bearing temperature failure detectors, acoustic detectors that identify failing bearings and evaluate the need for installing cameras along the tracks.
The measure returns to the House for consideration of changes made by the Senate.
“Of all the bills we pass in the Ohio General Assembly, this is the one that Ohioans see every day,” said Senate Transportation Committee Chair Stephanie Kunze, R-Dublin.
Sen. Michael Rulli, a Salem Republican whose district includes East Palestine, said the train wreck "hurt the community immensely and will be felt by our neighbors there for years to come. We must do better.”
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