(WBBM NEWSRADIO) – National Transportation Safety Board officials investigating this week’s Yellow Line crash will try to determine whether adding technology could prevent similar accidents in the future, the chair of the agency said Friday.
The CTA has "automatic train control,” which the NTSB says is not as comprehensive as the "positive train control” used on much of the national rail system.
NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy said investigators will try to determine whether positive train control would've made a difference here.
"It's something that we're going to be looking at as part of this investigation,” she told reporters at a Friday evening news conference.
Homendy confirmed that a piece of snow removal equipment was on the tracks at the time of the Thursday morning collision and that a crew was on board that equipment. But she could not say why it was there on a fairly balmy day. She says the NTSB is asking the CTA.
Homendy tried to reassure Chicago commuters that passenger rail remains safe.
“I would say rail transportation is incredibly safe. Incidents, unfortunately, do occur,” she said.
She stressed her agency is just beginning its investigation and expressed sympathy for people who were injured in the crash.
CTA officials had no estimate Friday on when Yellow Line service will resume.
Buses are leaving from Howard to go north to Dempster during the Yellow Line service suspension.
One woman who takes the Yellow Line regularly said she was running late Thursday, or else she would have been on the train that collided with a snow plow.
She says she feels lucky but also unsettled.
“To find out that train actually crashed is very scary,” she said.
Dozens of people were evaluated by paramedics, with 23 sent to the hospital, following the 10:45 a.m. accident. One of the most seriously injured was the train driver, and CTA President Dorval Carter tells WBBM Newsradio his condition is improving.
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