WASHINGTON
– The subway system in the nation's capital suffers from "serious
safety lapses" and the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority
must make scores of changes to fix them, federal regulators said
Wednesday.
The Federal Transit Administration ordered the safety measures across WMATA's rail and bus lines after a review triggered by a series of fatal accidents and collisions.
One of the most serious accidents, a collision of two Metrorail trains near the Fort Totten station in June 2009, killed eight passengers and a train operator.
The study found lapses in how the operations center schedules and conducts maintenance work, manages emergency events and ensures the safety of workers on the tracks.
The worst of 44 rail problems in the study included lapses in training for traffic controllers, staffing for rail operations and the poor quality of radios, according to the 116-page report. WMATA also noted 10 safety problems with its Metrobus lines.
"These are serious findings that strongly indicate that, despite gains made since the Fort Totten accident, WMATA's safety program is inadequate," Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said. "WMATA management, its board of directors and its state safety oversight agency must work together to address FTA's required actions, because the safety of passengers and personnel must be the top priority."
The regulators found that work crews don't have sufficient access to perform critical inspections, testing and maintenance. Regulators also noted clear deficiencies in technical training and refresher courses.
"Collectively, these issues significantly impact the ability of the Metrorail system to schedule and conduct maintenance work, to manage abnormal and emergency events, and to ensure the safety of trains and personnel" on the right-of-way, the report said.
As a result, regulators ordered WMATA to make 78 rail changes and 13 bus changes.
WMATA has 30 days to formally respond to the safety directives and then has to track its progress in fixing the problems during the following 60 days.
Jack Requa, interim general manager and CEO, welcomed the report as a road map to improve the Metro system.
"We will strengthen our operations, customer service and safety culture through training, staffing and ensuring compliance of safety policies and procedures," Requa said. "And with the understanding of our customers, we will address the need for a better balance between service and track outages to upgrade the system. We remain committed to creating an even safer system."
The FTA review followed a Jan. 12 incident where smoke from electrical arcing in the tunnel at the L'Enfant Plaza station produced toxic smoke that killed one passenger and injured 90 others.
In addition, seven collisions over the last decade involved workers in the right-of-way, resulting in nine deaths and several serious injuries.
Only the New York subway's 85 fatalities since 2008 exceeded WMATA's 29 deaths during that period, according to an FTA comparison of five major systems.
But federal regulators found the rate of deaths declining during that period, as WMATA adopted new management initiatives and improved the safety culture. For example, the organization added 67 jobs in the safety department, initiated a program to deal with fatigue among transit workers and developed new training programs for its technical workers.
"While FTA acknowledges WMATA's clear and substantial progress over the last five years," organizational deficiencies and operational concerns "continue to limit the agency's effectiveness in recognizing and resolving safety issues and hazards," the report said.
Regulators found repeated mistakes in how work crews communicated with train controllers. Examples included:
"WMATA
must commit to more employee safety training, increased track time for
maintenance work and a greater effort at identifying and reducing safety
risks to deliver the level of safety its passengers and employees
deserve," said Therese McMillan, FTA's acting administrator.
The Federal Transit Administration ordered the safety measures across WMATA's rail and bus lines after a review triggered by a series of fatal accidents and collisions.
One of the most serious accidents, a collision of two Metrorail trains near the Fort Totten station in June 2009, killed eight passengers and a train operator.
The study found lapses in how the operations center schedules and conducts maintenance work, manages emergency events and ensures the safety of workers on the tracks.
The worst of 44 rail problems in the study included lapses in training for traffic controllers, staffing for rail operations and the poor quality of radios, according to the 116-page report. WMATA also noted 10 safety problems with its Metrobus lines.
"These are serious findings that strongly indicate that, despite gains made since the Fort Totten accident, WMATA's safety program is inadequate," Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said. "WMATA management, its board of directors and its state safety oversight agency must work together to address FTA's required actions, because the safety of passengers and personnel must be the top priority."
The regulators found that work crews don't have sufficient access to perform critical inspections, testing and maintenance. Regulators also noted clear deficiencies in technical training and refresher courses.
"Collectively, these issues significantly impact the ability of the Metrorail system to schedule and conduct maintenance work, to manage abnormal and emergency events, and to ensure the safety of trains and personnel" on the right-of-way, the report said.
As a result, regulators ordered WMATA to make 78 rail changes and 13 bus changes.
WMATA has 30 days to formally respond to the safety directives and then has to track its progress in fixing the problems during the following 60 days.
Jack Requa, interim general manager and CEO, welcomed the report as a road map to improve the Metro system.
"We will strengthen our operations, customer service and safety culture through training, staffing and ensuring compliance of safety policies and procedures," Requa said. "And with the understanding of our customers, we will address the need for a better balance between service and track outages to upgrade the system. We remain committed to creating an even safer system."
The FTA review followed a Jan. 12 incident where smoke from electrical arcing in the tunnel at the L'Enfant Plaza station produced toxic smoke that killed one passenger and injured 90 others.
In addition, seven collisions over the last decade involved workers in the right-of-way, resulting in nine deaths and several serious injuries.
Only the New York subway's 85 fatalities since 2008 exceeded WMATA's 29 deaths during that period, according to an FTA comparison of five major systems.
But federal regulators found the rate of deaths declining during that period, as WMATA adopted new management initiatives and improved the safety culture. For example, the organization added 67 jobs in the safety department, initiated a program to deal with fatigue among transit workers and developed new training programs for its technical workers.
"While FTA acknowledges WMATA's clear and substantial progress over the last five years," organizational deficiencies and operational concerns "continue to limit the agency's effectiveness in recognizing and resolving safety issues and hazards," the report said.
Regulators found repeated mistakes in how work crews communicated with train controllers. Examples included:
- April 24, 2012: The first car of a six-car train derailed in Rosslyn after the control center told the operator to ignore a red signal at a switch that wasn't clamped.
- Nov. 7, 2012: Controllers restored power to tracks in Landover while roadway workers were still present.
- Oct. 14, 2013: Trains collided in the West Falls Church service shop when an operator wasn't informed that a pair of cars in a moving train had their brakes cut out.
- Dec. 29, 2014: Workers in the right-of-way at the King Street station were nearly hit by a train.
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