EDITORIAL: Amtrak has to fix labor relations and get back on safety track | Editorial
The stunning finding from Tuesday's
In appropriately blunt language, the
"Despite the emphasis on rules compliance, investigators did not find a culture of compliance at all," said Chairman
If Amtrak employees could just communicate with each other, this accident never would have happened.
But on
The one piece of equipment which could have stopped the crash is called a shunt. It alters electrical current flowing through the tracks, which in turn alerts dispatchers that workers are on the tracks so they can divert trains. But the foreman didn't have a shunt because Amtrak didn't supply one, even though procedures called for it.
Line workers were another problem. Two shifts performed the routine maintenance on the eve of the fatal crash. After finishing, the night shift foreman canceled an order to stop trains from using the tracks. The day shift foreman didn't ask dispatchers to reinstate the order, so at
Amtrak itself is in peril with
Amtrak is trying to upgrade itself knowing that if the trains aren't safe, ridership will suffer. The rail company has improved safety protocols, management and training. But none of these improvements can work until Amtrak looks inward and fixes its lethal environment.
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