Washington subway crash

[tw]

Originally Posted by glatt

It makes me wonder about the wisdom of having the trains run by computer and the drivers just there as a back-up.

So that humans can perform their job, roads must be (but not always) designed so that the human can see beyond what is required to stop (which is also why superior cars use orange - not red - rear turn signals). Trains don't do that. Trains are dependent on a signaling system. Therefore the train operator could not stop the train. Train was traveling too fast around a blind corner for the operator to do anything. This is normal on most every railroad.

Blind turns are typically not a problem. Reason why this crash is reported: because train crashes are so close to zero as to be virtually zero. The system works.

And so again, the questions. Why did backup systems fail? For example, one backup system is maintenance people who are empowered to do their job. Why was this train's computer not instructed by track sensors (as latest reports suggest)?

Again, I am going right back to the reason for such failures. How often do you also use the parking brake? Exact same attitude with equal consequences. Deaths and injury created by not applying the parking brake are rarely reported, in part, because it happens.

About six months ago in a nearby town, she got out of the car to get the mail. Car in park started rolling down the driveway. She ran to jump into the car just as the car door hit a tree. She remained there for 45 minutes until someone bothered to look closer. Death directly traceable to someone who did not routinely implement (enable) a backup system. And simply too common to get equal attention.