Metro officials admitted Monday they are worried that a computer problem that halted trains twice over the weekend could happen again at any time, as they search for what caused a mapping system in the agency’s control center to fail.
The transit agency detailed its investigation into the glitch, ironically explaining what happened at an already scheduled announcement of new federal safety standards at the very site where the system failed.
Elected officials on hand for the news conference noted that riders aren’t pleased with the failure, which stopped the entire system, coming on top of a recent derailment, a chaotic Green Line evacuation, train operators running red signals and brake parts falling off trains.
| New federal safety standards touted at Metro |
| New federal safety standards will close a loophole that has prevented federal officials from regulating subway systems. |
| The law was proposed in the wake of the 2009 Fort Totten Metro crash that killed nine people. But the final version was watered down from original proposals, giving existing state oversight agencies more power to control transit agencies. |
| Still, the law allows the U.S. Department of Transportation to set minimum standards for rail car equipment and create a safety certification and training process. |
| Federal Transit Administrator Peter Rogoff said it was unlikely that federal officials would set a limit on hours of service for subway workers but noted that fatigue would be an issue the Federal Transit Administration would address with state groups. |
| The new law, which will take years to fully enact, also allows the FTA to withhold money from transit agencies if they don’t comply. |
| “It’s not a tool we want to use, but it’s a tool we will use,” Rogoff said. – Kytja Weir |
“Many of my constituents are really disturbed,” said Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., noting that the tone of emails flooding into her office was “volcanic.”
Sen. Ben Cardin, D-Md., also called for answers. “The patrons have a right to know, they need to know,” he said.
Mikulski called on the Federal Transit Administration to update its 2010 audit of Metro’s safety culture — a scathing report that found widespread problems throughout the agency. “We have to make sure people don’t lose confidence in Metro,” she said.
Riders’ Advisory Council member Joseph Kitchen called for a regional hearing on the computer failures, run by local authorities, not the agency’s board, which he said has become “timid, slow and soft on asking the tough questions.”
The system that failed from about 2:10 to 2:50 p.m. Saturday, then again for about an hour starting at 12:30 a.m. Sunday, involves an electronic mapping tool that allows the main operations control center to see the entire rail system, Metro second-in-command Dave Kubicek said. It is not the same system that senses trains and keeps them from crashing, nor did it affect the radio or communications system.
“It’s a reliability issue, not a safety issue,” said Metro spokesman Dan Stessel.
The transit agency can see the trains moving on a localized level at sites around the system, but the map helps those in the central command center. During the failures, Kubicek said, they stopped trains as a precaution, then relied on radio and land-line calls to coordinate with those field offices which trains should go where.
Officials from ARINC, which made the advanced information management system, or AIM, were at the Carmen Turner Facility in Landover where the failure occurred, with staff working “24/7” to determine what failed. Kubicek said they have ruled out outside hackers because AIM is a closed-loop system.
Metro and elected officials spoke Monday of how the aging transit system needs continued investment after years of neglect. But AIM itself is about five years old, Stessel said.
