airman00 wrote:I would think the safety of the passengers matters more than whose engineer is operating which loco. I do understand however that rules are rules, and if a crew's shift is over, than broken loco or not, a fresh crew is required to come in. In which case, it should be amtrak if they can get there, (with back-up power, such as another road engine or a switcher if that's all that's nearby), or if not then the host frieght line, such as NS in this case should help/tow the amtrak either to the nearest station or to at least a point where the nearest amtrak crew could take over.
As long as companies cooperate and work together than should be no problem. Besides I thought all RR's had some back-up engines like protect engines ready in case of emergency. Be it sw's or road engines.
Mr Airman00,
May I ask where exactly are you going with this?
Is there a specific incident you wish to discuss, or are you just throwing out various scenarios to see what the answer may be?
Your posts seem to be mixing various questions together. The topic is "Can freight Engineers move Amtrak trains these days?". Asked and answered.
You mentioned "safety of the passengers" above. If there was an EMERGENCY situation where the Amtrak crew ran out of time and the train, it's passengers, crew, or member(s) of the public were in danger of losing life or limb, a high ranking supervisor would order the Amtrak crew to violate the Hours of Service Act and move the train and it's passengers to a safe location to be recrewed. Simply running out of time between stations without relief IS NOT an emergency.
You seem to imply freight Engineers should "get on and go" when Amtrak has a problem. That's not going to happen for the reasons cited in the posts above. Freight Engineers ARE NOT familiar with, nor qualified, to operate Amtrak equipment. Unqualified freight Engineers running Amtrak trains is a lawsuit waiting for a court date.
Freight railroads do not have "standby", "protect", nor "back up" locos sitting around. Host railroads do supply locos for mechanically disabled Amtrak trains frequently; provided a loco is available.
"If I don't have it, or can't get it, neither should YOU." - America today.