NEW YORK — An Amtrak Acela train bound from Boston to New York was stalled on the Northeast Corridor for more than seven hours after losing power on Monday, the Associated Press reports.
Train No. 2151 left Boston at 5:05 a.m. but lost power in the Hunter’s Point neighborhood of Queens at 8:37 a.m., 10 minutes before its scheduled arrival in New York. It finally began moving again at 3:20 p.m. after a rescue engine arrived and brought it to Penn Station about 4 p.m., according to WCBS-TV. Passengers continuing on from New York were transferred there to other trains.
The train was carrying 106 passengers, an Amtrak spokesman said. A rider told the AP that passengers were not kept informed as the delay progressed.
There’s no conceivable excuse to delay the customers (not just passengers) on that Acela, or any other Amtrak “service”, for that long. Even if the catenary is fouled, it seems there were no delays to what were probably numerous other trains through there. Are bridge plates that hard to find and manage? And it certainly shouldn’t take that long to get ANY relief unit out there from Sunnyside.
What if (worse case) the train had derailed at low speed and there were no injuries? Would the passengers have been made to sit there for seven hours then?
Maybe there’s more to this than is easily seen publicly, but this is totally unacceptable. AT MINIMUM, all those delayed should have been reimbursed the cost of their ticket and offered generous vouchers toward future travel.
Don’t understand how you have an engine brake down for 7 hrs. with passengers on the tracks in the Bronx when Amtrak has a yard just on the other side of the tunnel coming from Penn Station into Sunnyside Queens, when you drive over the bridge that goes over the yard to Queens Blvd there must be a dozen engines or so and the passenger cars sitting idle in that yard at any given time, you’re telling me they couldn’t get a train to go up to the Bronx and rescue that train and 109 passengers, it might have taken 20mins to get to Hunts Point Section. This is the responsibility and dereliction of the duties of the upper management simply put heads should have rolled with terminations !!!
I was stuck on an Acela once going from Boston to Philadelphia just south of Rahway NJ. The train pulled down the wires and we were stuck for about 2 hours. No power, so no AC just emergency lights. They finally pulled a conventional Amfleet train next to us and we crossed over using bridge plates. Very little info was given to us on that occasion. They eventually told us we couldn’t be transferred until they shut down the power on our track. Still, at least 15 to 20 trains passed us going south on either side of us. After that no apology or anything from Amtrak. At least I got a $50 travel voucher from Delta for my inconvience when my flight from Atlanta to Miami had to shut down one of it’s engines and had to return to Atlanta.
One more comment.
I’m sure the people at Sunnyside and Penn Station are thoroughly embarrassed by this incident and intend to make sure it never happens again.
I might note NY had 1-2 inches of snow Sunday (2-13) which was still around 2-14, when it didn’t go above freezing. I wonder if officials were afraid to let 2151’s passengers off into the snow to change trains that close to Penn Station.
Things that make you say “Hmmmm”
As to coupling to an Acela train, inside the fairing on the front where a coupler should be there is …. a coupler!
As to losing hotel power, it depends on what failed. If the train completely lost 12 kV overhead power, first the batteries would deplete then the train would be cold dead. If propulsion only failed, likely hotel power would continue uninterrupted.
According the news reports the hotel power stayed on but the train could not move.
It would be nice and informative if a Trains correspondent like Bob Johnston, could conduct a solid interview with Stephen Gardner.
Ask him about the 7 hour delay to the Acela in Queens.
Ask him about the continual mechanical issues in Chicago and if anything is being done to rectify them.
Ask him how the new Chargers are operating…both the corridor units and the the new LD units.
Ask him if they are washing ALL trains on a regular basis. Find out what the policy is for washing equipment.
Ask him why they have turned the Texas Eagle, Capitol Limited and the City of New Orleans into subpar trains (poor dining, no lounge, etc.)
Ask him what Amtrak is doing regarding recruiting new employees to its company that will provide good customer service.
Ask him what Amtrak is doing to increase revenue as opposed to just cutting costs.
Ask him how the current Amtrak traveler is going to benefit from the infrastructure bill recently passed by Congress.
And most important ask him why the only consistency with Amtrak is INCONSISTENCY!
That’s one early commute to work I think I’d consider moving closer to my job in NYC or find another job.
It should have been rescued within two hours!
This was of course on the local news here in NYC. I was hoping for more detailed explanation at least here. 7 hours is a total puzzlement
Gardner has an obligation to make a detailed statement on this event to the public.
Don’t bet on Gardner doing that. Remember the first public announcement following the head-on between #91 and a stopped CSX train in SouthCarolina? #91 “made contact” with a freight train. At best he’ll deliver some corporate doublespeak and the top officers at NARP/RPA will maintain dutiful silence. The latter is too busy dumping on CSX and NS at the STB hearings now taking place for their resistance to the NOL-Mobile two daily roundtrips.
You loose power 10 minutes from one of your major stations on the NEC, Five minutes from Sunnyside yards and it takes Seven hours to get a rescue engine to pull the train to Penn Station????????? No wonder people have so many questions about Amtrak. It is time to put railroaders in charge of Amtrak, not airline execs or the Federal Government who can’t even do their job with any competence. Non excuse for this.
Didn’t take much longer than that for Pan Am to get a replacement DC-7 (prop) from New York to Gander, New Fundland in 1961.
CORRECTION HUNTS POINT IS A SECTION IN THE BRONX…..HUNTERSPOINT IS A SECTION IN LONG ISLAND CITY JUST A FEW MINUTES OUT OF PENN STATION.
JR Central N700S Shinkansen train sets are designed with batteries that enable a train without power to move at low speed for several miles. The long delay may have been due to the Acela train getting tangled up with trolley wire – that’s a mess as the wire crews have to come out, de energize the circuits, and remove the wire before the train can be moved.
7 hours. This story needs alot more explanation.
Hunters Point is in Bronx, not Queens, Bad place to get stuck. I’m surprised the train wasn’t destroyed while it sat there.
The only route Amtrak has fully staffed is NEC. This is the only route Amtrak wouldn’t be dependent on a freight railroad fir a rescue engine. More than seven hours? Not acceptable.
We read on these pages from forum members here in the hinterland that they resent Amtrak’s focus on NEC. Seems we’re not missing much.
6:40+ delay? Lack of crew to man the rescue engine? Or does Amtrak not normally man that loco anymore?
How does the rescue engine couple to an Acela? Chains? Or does a panel come off to reveal a normal coupler?
Maybe the new loco just pushes the crippled train.
Mr Thomas, I believe that all equipment operating on North American Railroads must have a standard railroad coupler and draft gear as a backup to any different coupling system that they may be using as well as a backup air brake system to electronic braking for this type of emergency.
I assume there is no hotel power when electric trains lose power. This could be serious quickly in the wrong weather.
I know when i am delayed an explanation means everything. Its not that hard to do.