No injuries, at least one car derailed. It looks like the front of the train was unaffected and the passengers were loaded into cars up front and the rest of train proceeded to Seattle. We've had lots of rain this weekend, so a service disruption wasn't unexpected, but wiping out part of the Empire Builder is a surprise.
Posted by Vincent206 (Member # 15447) on :
This derailment was front page, headline news in The Seattle Times this morning. The headline screamed:
quote:Amtrak derailment ‘like being thrown around like a rag doll’
Seems like that was a bit of an over-reaction.
Posted by notelvis (Member # 3071) on :
Hmnn........
I wish that they could figure out a way to stabalize that section of railroad during rainy season.
Posted by Vincent206 (Member # 15447) on :
Read the report more carefully, it says, "$16.1 million in federal funding to identify, design and construct slope stabilization". Note the and CONSTRUCT the slope stabilization.
In the same report, "Project teams from WSDOT and BSNF are doing design and engineering work on a number of repair strategies like retaining walls, improved drainage systems and erosion control."
At least there seems to be more than going on than just talk. Two reasons: The appropriation includes money to actually do the fix, not just talk about, and the railroad companies are not in the habit of wasting money on studies unless it involves an issue they really intend to do something about.
Find out what happens if you try to get a lot of free information out of a railroad company to plug into one of the multitudinous enless transit studies. The essence of the response is usually something like, "Here is what we have easily available. If you want more bring your checkbook."