Report: Engineer distracted
WASHINGTON — Victims of last year’s deadly Amtrak derailment aren’t buying the findings of federal investigators that the train’s engineer likely lost his bearings because he was distracted by an incident with a nearby train.
Through lawyers, they called the National Transportation Safety Board’s cause determination frustrating, disappointing and hard to believe. One lawyer called Tuesday’s explanation a “whitewash.” Another said it was a “quantum leap.”
They said the official report on the May 12, 2015 wreck only prompted more questions.
Having ruled out other factors including equipment problems and cell phone use, investigators determined that engineer Brandon Bostian lost track of where he was after hearing on the radio that a commuter train had been struck with a rock.
At the same time, investigators said, Bostian accelerated full-throttle, causing the train to reach 106 mph as it entered a sharp curve with a 50 mph speed limit.
“Excluding all the other suspects that we looked at, the best we could come up with was that he was distracted from this radio conversation about the damaged train and forgot where he was,” NTSB chairman Christopher Hart said.
Eight people aboard the Washington-to-New York train were killed and more than 200 were injured.
Bostian, who has been suspended without pay since the crash, did not attend the hearing.
The NTSB said a contributing factor in the derailment was the railroad industry’s decades-long failure to fully install positive train control — GPS-based technology that can automatically slow trains that are going over the speed limit.
