COMMENTARY BY ALEXANDER B. CRAGHEAD
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NATIONAL TRANSPORTATION SAFETY BOARD INVESTIGATORS AND FIRST RESPONDERS ON THE SCENE OF THE AMTRAK TRAIN NO. 188 DERAILMENT IN PHILADELPHIA, PA, ON MAY 13, 2015. PHOTO COURTESY NATIONAL TRANSPORTATION SAFETY BOARD
Tragedy and Speculation
RAILROADING, like most forms of transpor- tation, is a potentially dangerous industry, and on May 12, there was yet another tragic example of this. At about 9:30 p.m. Eastern Time, Amtrak Train 188 struck a 50 m.p.h. curve north of Philadelphia at 106 m.p.h., and derailed. Cars scattered off the right-of-way. One of the coaches was nearly unrecognizable as it was twisted and shredded into pieces. Aerial images from news helicopters showed a scene that looked almost like a plane crash. Of the 243 people on board, eight died, and by the appearance of the scene it was a surprise that the number was that low. As we go to press, the exact cause of the
crash remains unknown, and it’s quite likely it will remain that way for some time. The investigation of major derailments such as this one takes painstaking, methodical work by trained professionals at the National Transportation Safety Board. As NTSB board member Robert Sumwalt told CNN on the day after the incident, the investigation could take up to a year to complete. “It’s a tedious process, but we’re confident we have good data that will help us to determine the cause of this accident.” Yet in the aftermath of the derailment, speculation ran rampant. The press followed every lead to try and explain the wreck, which was to be expected. The cacophony of statements from politicians only added to the din. The mayor of New York complained that U.S. infrastructure investment was far below the level of Europe and Asia, and that this had contributed to the wreck. The New York Times editorial board agreed. Meanwhile, the House Appropriations Committee voted to slash Amtrak’s budget, and the media quickly pointed out the irony of the timing. The mayor of Philadelphia blamed the engineer, stating that there was “no excuse other than a heart attack” for exceeding the track speed limit. Eight people were dead, but the wreck had become a field in the blood sport that is American politics. Unfortunately, the speculation was not confined to politics. Online, various railfan
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discussion forums became battlegrounds where opinion overrode fact. The locomotive was blamed, the track was blamed, the signal system was blamed, the crew was blamed. And still the speculation grew, until it
became a pastime for almost everybody. Even here in the Bay Area, where I live — more than 2500 miles away from the wreck — it could not be escaped. “They say that the engineer was accelerating into the curve, instead of decelerating,” I heard one fellow BART passenger state. The passenger’s conclusion? “It’s just like that Lufthansa pilot in France.” With no evidence, the engineer of Amtrak 188 had been lumped in with Andreas Lubitz, the disturbed pilot for Lufthansa subsidiary Germanwings who on March 24 had intentionally crashed an Airbus A320 into the French Alps, killing all 150 aboard. That a spectacular derailment of this sort
should invite public interest and scrutiny is not shocking, and nor should it be surprising that humans enjoy gossiping and speculating about even the most gruesome things. Yet that politicians like New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter (both Democrats), and the (Republican-led) House Appropriations Committee do so is far more troubling. Laws made as knee-jerk reactions to tragedy are rarely good policy, and attempts to use tragedies to score ideolog- ical points (be they in favor of infrastructure spending, or in favor of limiting the size of government) are shameful, no matter who makes them. Yet the ultimate lesson of the social and political aftermath of the wreck of Amtrak 188 is that it’s likely that, more often than not, this is precisely how we make policy in this country. By the time the NTSB is done determining what caused May’s fatal derail- ment, it will be too late. The press, the public, and the politicians will have already made their own determinations and convictions and have moved on.
Consulting Editor Alexander B. Craghead is a transportation historian, photographer, artist, and author.
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