02-25-2010, 07:42 AM | #76 | ||
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The NTSB is holding hearings this week. The first day of hearings provided no new information. Yesterday did provide some very interesting information that I hadn't heard before.
Alstom, the maker of the sensor that mysteriously failed to sense a train, causing the Metro train crash last June, is blaming Metro for using 3rd party hardware in the circuit. They mixed brand new 3rd party hardware with a 40 year old circuit and didn't give the technicians installing the new hardware instructions on how to do it correctly. Quote:
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02-25-2010, 09:24 AM | #77 |
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The cynic in me says they deliberately won't be fixing the circuits until the whole investigation and final rulings are done, because to do so would be admitting that that was the problem in the first place.
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02-25-2010, 07:00 PM | #78 | |||
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However the reporter did include what any 15 year old would understand: Quote:
The Alstom bi-phase data port can only output 10 milliamps. The Union Signal receiver requires 12 milliamps minimum. We don't know anything until we have those numbers. Then a significant minority learn from the 1% how simplistic this really is AND how much contempt management had by not knowing something that students in college physics labs measure. If responsible management was told this, then a responsible management would have shut down that entire region - replaced all signaling with emergency flagmen. If those numbers were provided, then reporter’s other hearsay (subjective) quote has credibility. Any manager in Metro - even personal director - who could not understand significance in those numbers should be fired for not being sufficiently educated in basic management principles. Answers must always include the perspective of numbers. Without numbers, then perspective is easily replaced by emotion and wild speculation. Demonstrated is the same problem in this discussion: Toyota stop sale. Apparently we do not only have a serious Metro management problem. We also have an investigation committee or newspaper reporter with the same problem. Answers given without numbers should result in sharp condemnation. People died. Subjective citations simply insult even the victims. No numbers why the problem would not be fixed; requiring, if necessary, widespread and public condemnation. There is sufficient evidence to indict management. The investigation committee’s job is to obtain facts – especially numbers – to convert an indictment into a scathing accusation. Doing any less would even insult victims of that crash. And should concern every Metro user. How to have a solution. It starts with the reporters always including numbers. If a power mismatch exists, the reporter must include the appropriate numbers or a URL. Numbers must always exist to provide the necessary perspective. No numbers is how the "politically correct" get problems ignored. |
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02-25-2010, 07:30 PM | #79 |
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Yeah. Well, the Post is a shell of its former self. I'm just glad they had a reporter at the hearing.
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02-25-2010, 07:34 PM | #80 |
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Sounds like the same thing Toyota is trying to do with their electronics.
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02-25-2010, 11:34 PM | #81 | |
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Is it the Post that is degrading? Or is it a new breed of reporter taught to be a communication major and therefore does not understand how to ferret out the irrefutable fact?
I was amazed back at Watergate and again during "Mission Accomplished" how Bob Woodward routinely corralled facts. I was always amazed how David Habersham even identified an American defeat in Vietnam by viewing facts ... in 1963. And I routinely have contempt for the local 'Action News' or NBC Dateline who spend so much time with gossip or hype for ratings. I truly miss Ted Koppel. Is it the Post that does not have talent? Or are so many communication majors do not learn what is necessary to have a fact? There are fundamental reasons why all military academies graduate everyone with engineering training. The military needs people who can analyze and extract the irrefutable fact. Quote:
Does Metro have severe problems? 40% of the deaths in America are all one that one transit system. Numbers are damning. By not providing numbers, someone is either hiding something. Or someones are simply not able to grasp fundamental and damning facts. Or a third possibility. The entire Metro management is being manipulated for a massive beheading. I doubt it. But that is also a possibility. |
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02-26-2010, 02:21 AM | #82 |
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C'mon, tw. The reporter isn't cross examining these people, just reporting what is said in the hearings. It's up to the people holding the hearings to ask for details.
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02-26-2010, 08:13 AM | #84 | |
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I found an official aerial map of the sight distances, similar to the one I whipped together in the days after the accident on Google Earth, looking for answers that nobody was providing.
So of course, I had to see how close I was in my armchair analysis. I wrote that: Quote:
I had been measuring from the position of the crashed trains, and it turns out the stopped train was pushed down the track about 3-4 meters by the impact, and I hadn't accounted for that. So my calculations were pretty damn close. Much closer than I expected. Last edited by glatt; 02-26-2010 at 08:18 AM. |
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02-26-2010, 08:26 AM | #85 |
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Cool.
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02-26-2010, 12:40 PM | #86 | |
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Bottom line - the numbers were not provided and are absolutely necessary. |
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02-26-2010, 02:03 PM | #87 | ||||
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Critical is something called bobbing. In simple terms, a transmitter at one end of two rails sends an audio signal to a receiver at the other end. Each interlock has its own frequency. If the receiver 'hears' the signal, then a relay closes. If anything appears on that track, the rails are 'shunted' together. No transmitter signal gets to the receiver. The relay opens. A train must be on that track when no signal is heard. But the system has been defective (intermittent) for two years. Bobbing constantly. No useful solution implemented by identifying the problem. IOW repairs rarely identified a problem before 'fixing' it. They did what so many (probably a majority of) untrained A+ Computer Techs do. They just keep replacing parts until something worked. And yes, this summary in Toyota stop sale applies. In both cases, we are talking about a logic one condition, a logic zero condition, and the always existing third state. The world is not binary. The world is ternary. That interlock system had noise that caused 'bobbing'. Caused constant failures (an intermittent failure is a complete failure). In one case, while trying to fix bobbing on one track, suddenly bobbing was observed on an adjacent track. It is not clear if or why the adjacent track was also not fixed. Other factors are discussed implying significance. The phone system was inoperable or unreliable even though conversations essential to human safety were reportedly conducted on that system. Rains had completely flooded phone and signalling wires days previous. But the reason for bobbing appears (may be) completely different. And something that no track maintenance people could possibly discover. They needed serious and better trained assistance. Instead they kept shotgunning. A failure exists. So one keeps replacing parts until failures go away? Nonsense. Unfortunately so many never learn how to analyze before solving a problem. So they shotgun. Bottom line: from what I understand, that entire section of track was completely unreliable for almost two years. At minimum, every engineer should have been trained to approach Fort Totten as if the system was always defective. We know this new (three month) engineer did what she was trained to do and what the signals told her to do - went through a blind curve at normal speed. That report has numbers that the reporter should have been reporting. Bobbing was even reported via the remote data units (RDU) that receive that information every one second. But (apparently) no system existed to alarm on bobbing so that network operators could take immediate emergency action. Bobbing at the highest levels of management was considered all but normal operation. 85% of all problems are directly traceable to top management. When bobbing occurs, transmitter power is changed (ie increased) in some desperate hope to solve the problem using the Tim Allen joke: "More Power!". Those new and 40 year old signalling devices are compatible. But require adjustments that are always done anyway on every track. If the reporter was reading facts, she would not hype about mixing 40 year old equipment with new equipment. She would have read the report. Noted (by my definition of reliability) that entire section of signalling was completely defectve - intermittent. And that nobody had identified the problem. Just kept trying to fix it - for two years. Shotgunning (except in a few instances) was the only repair technique. If your auto mechanic used shotgunning, he should be quickly unemployeed. And yet so many Americans so little learn how to analyze (solve) problems that shotgunning (especially in computer repair) is normal. It appears shotgunning was relavent for causing nine deaths. And it appears the reporter also did not identify the actual problem. Her report without the word 'bobbing' is woefully negligent. Also discovered were supervisor errors: Quote:
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Last edited by tw; 02-26-2010 at 02:17 PM. |
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02-26-2010, 02:30 PM | #88 | |
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How obvious was the problem?
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The report then goes on to explain why maintenance people needed high tech help. But high tech assistance was not called. Instead, they just kept replacing parts on wild speculation - shotgunning. |
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02-26-2010, 03:09 PM | #89 |
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Nonsense, the normal newspaper reading public's eyes would just glaze over at the numbers in that report. They only want to read who is blaming whom for the failures. It's not up to them, or you, to figure out the technical details of what went wrong. That's the job of the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, and the people they employ. I doubt the shiny shoed whores in the front office would understand the technical aspects of the system, or it's failures, but they are definitely obligated to create a culture that understands and responds to these numbers. They failed to do that, and are accountable.
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02-26-2010, 05:52 PM | #90 | |
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The O'ring, in this case, is 'bobbing'. Bobbing is the damning fact ignored for days in this location. A problem ongoing throughout the day - and ignored. A similar even even discovered in another Tri-State Oversight board evaluation that the board accidently discovered in March 2009. Even the 'near victim' train operator was not aware of a failure. But we are all so dumb as to need our reporters to also keep us dumb. Meanwhile glatt did the reporter's job. Kudos. Only eyes that glaze over are those that love to be dumb and stupid. They don't have any business reading newspapers anyway. Maybe we should pass a law that if one is dumb and stupid, then he must not be permitted to buy a paper. That would solve everything. We should be discussing murder charges for those nine deaths. |
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