Metro said Tuesday it is reviewing its policies on notifying an independent safety oversight committee after a weekend accident in which it failed to notify the group within the required two hours.
“Contact should have been made following the incident,” Metro spokesman Steven Taubenkibel acknowledged. “We will review our own policies and procedures to ensure all notifications are made.”
The Examiner first reported about Saturday’s crash and the delayed notification. A Metro maintenance vehicle carrying 20 workers slid into a contractor’s rail truck on icy tracks around 8:35 p.m. Saturday, causing a domino effect on the Red Line near the Grosvenor-Strathmore station that damaged at least four vehicles. No one was reported injured.
Metro contacted one member of the independent Tri-State Oversight Committee about the crash Monday — more than 24 hours afterward — although the agency is required to notify the committee about rail vehicle crashes within two hours.
TOC Chairman Eric Madison told The Examiner he was not notified directly and called Metro on Monday when he heard rumors about the crash.
“I’m glad that they are looking at the policies and process,” Madison said Tuesday. “From our end, we’d like to get to the bottom of why we were not notified Saturday.”
Metro initially said the crash did not meet the criteria for notification as no one was hurt and it did not meet the $25,000 damage amount required. But the agency has not said how much damage the crash caused and has not released the name of the contractor whose equipment was damaged.
The eight federal criteria for notification to safety oversight groups include collisions between rail transit vehicles.
It was the latest safety misstep for Metro. Last year it denied the safety group access to its live tracks to study track safety, then the inspectors were nearly hit by a speeding train once they were allowed to perform the announced inspections.
The crash occurred less than a week after Metro track workers Jeff Garrard, 49, and Sung Oh, 68, were fatally struck by the same type of rail truck damaged in Saturday’s crash, on the same line.
