Three things to consider

Today, I want to look at three occurrences that made at least some kind of railroad news in the past month. I’m not focusing on them to analyze what is wrong, but to point out what is right in American passenger railroading today.

1. On July 2, 2016, the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) had to withdraw 120 Silverliner V passenger cars from service on account of “significant structural defects.” The defects were noticed on July 1 after it was discovered that a number of the cars were leaning off center. While not a safety issue per se, it was decided to withdraw the cars. Some of the cars, made in South Korea by Hyundai Rotem and assembled in Philadelphia, have been in service since 2010.

1. In August 2015, a Midwest Corridor car prototype scheduled for manufacture at Nippon Sharyo’s expanded plant in Rochelle, Illinois, failed an 800,000-pound compression test, indefinitely postponing manufacturing, resulting in layoffs, and placing funding for some of the contracted purchasing agencies (all commuter railroads) in jeopardy.

1. On July 12, 2016, two Italian passenger trains, both a variety of commuter express, collided head-on near Corato in southern Italy. Aerial photographs of the scene show the almost total disintegration of the front cars of both trains.

If you have been paying attention, you probably already know where I’m going with this. The fact is, American standards for crashworthiness of passenger rail cars are significantly more stringent than those in Europe. Where American engineering standards err, they err on the side of passenger survivability.

The case of the failed compression test illustrates not only how seriously a failure is taken, but also, perhaps, how difficult it is to meet the standards. Nippon Sharyo is absolutely not a novice car builder. Their company Web site boasts of 1018 cars built for eight different buyers since 1982. While such a failure in a newly engineered car type is not unheard of, I guarantee that it is no small matter to a manufacturer that wants to retain and build a market share that is not inconsiderable. I’m sure the engineering department will be consuming antacids and energy drinks in equal amounts until the re-engineering is completed.

Nobody wants a crash, but when it occurs, you don’t want it to be your fault. The average passenger is protected not only by high crashworthiness standards, but by the vigilance of inspectors like those who discovered the Silverliner V fault. That such vigilance is incentivized by high liability costs and possible prosecution for criminal negligence doesn’t hurt anyone, particularly not the train passenger.

Then, too, when a crash does occur, it would be preferable that the wrecks don’t look like the scene in Italy. Yes, we’ve had our share of those; but the vast majority of American crashes involve the passenger cars remaining intact, mostly upright, and many times with minor or no derailments at all. Something has to absorb the energy, of course, when that happens. Blunt force from a human body getting thrown against a hard object can be just as deadly as crushing weight, traumatic amputation and decapitation. That’s why engineers work to provide interior fittings that not only absorb energy but do, in fact, provide hollows and “safe” spaces when crushing forces do invade the passenger compartment.

And not everything works. During my days as an accident investigator, adjuster and surveyor on transportation-related losses, I photographed a Nippon-Sharyo NICTD (Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District) unit that hit a truck carrying steel coil—heavy steel coil. Neither the railroad car nor the truck fared well, but the interior photographs of the car show that the seats and interior fittings did just what they were supposed to do, even though the crushing forces were too severe to prevent injury to all involved. My point is that there is nothing that will make American passenger cars totally safe. Nothing. But there is nothing wrong with making that a goal, either.

©2016 – C. A. Turek – mistertrains@gmail.com

(Charles A. Turek is a writer and novelist based in Albuquerque, NM. After four decades working in areas of the insurance industry related to transportation, he now writes on all aspects of American railroading. Charles is a political conservative but believes in public funding of passenger rail as a part of the federal government’s constitutionally conservative obligation to provide for defense and public infrastructure so that private enterprise may flourish.)