BOSTON — Five members of an Amtrak maintenance-of-way crew have been taken to a hospital following an incident at a Boston rail yard Friday morning, WXFT-TV reports.
The injuries are non-life-threatening, Amtrak said in a statement.
The incident occurred about 4:30 a.m. at the Readville commuter rail station in Boston’s Hyde Park neighborhood, about 8 miles south of Boston Back Bay station.
WCVB reports the injuries occurred when two on-track vehicles collided, according to MBTA Transit Police, who said the two vehicles sustained substantial damage. The station says it was told by a railroad worker that one vehicle rear-ended another when the first was stopped for a signal.
One of the pieces of equipment, derailed by the collision, was rerailed using a bucket loader. By about 3:30 p.m., it had been removed and the area was cleared.
Transit Police Superintendent Richard Sullivan said in a statement that the department’s accident reconstruction unit was investigating, the Boston Globe reports.
It is the second maintenance incident for Amtrak on the Northeast Corridor in a week. A Northeast Regional train struck maintenance equipment near Kingston, R.I., on Friday, May 5 [see “No injuries reported as Amtrak train strikes track equipment …,” Trains News Wire, May 7, 2023]. One Amfleet coach was damaged in that incident.
— Updated at 6:15 p.m. CDT with additional details.
This happened at 4:30am?
Perhaps instead of blaming the ‘culture’ of Amtrak, or even bad mouthing our President or Transportation Secretary, maybe, just maybe, they needed another cup of coffee? Not excusing them by any means, but instead of trying a torniquet around the neck, how about a Band-Aid — it is good nobody really got hurt at this ‘traffic accident’… pay attention while driving!
HEY “sleepy ” Joe and “papa ” Pete enough is enough it’s time to clear the deck and dysfunctional Board of a totally failed Amtrack.
Might want to enlighten yourself a little bit on this one. It involved a maintenance gang, not a train. The first piece of equipment stopped at a stop signal as planned. The second piece of equipment did not. Sounds like there was either a failure to communicate or the second machine was just going to fast to stop in time. At 4:30 in the morning, there was probably dew on the rail causing it to be slick. Machines will skate on wet rail. I know, I ran on-track equipment for 32 years. Kinda hard to see what a board of directors could have done to prevent that.
Seems like no safety culture at Amtrak going back many years. Hard to believe that after each incident and an investigation that procedures, policies and work rules are amended or changed so as to prevent the same thing from happening again.