Major derailment @ Spuyten Duyvil

[Clean Cab]

The rail damage and train wreckage is south of where the Empire Connection joins MN track four at CP 12, so hopefully Amtrak service can resume before MN service does.

[Rockingham Racer]

Amtrak's Empire Service suspended both directions between Albany and NYP till further notice...

Today of all days when people are going home after thanksgiving. A real shame. Hope all those affected recover soon & family and friends of the departed find comfort for their loss.

Are there any alternate routes for the Empire to get people out of the city

Nope.

[MBTA1016]

Lets not speculate the cause until the ntsb investigates it. That's what causes these threads to be locked. That's a dangerous curve apparently after this and the Csx derailment last summer. Yes I know the Csx one was on the other side of the station

[nessman]

I'm sorry, but I cannot think that Governor Cuomo and his entourage showing up on the scene at 2 hours could be anything other than a complication for the emergency responders.

In a few weeks we'll have the SAFE Train Act enacted overnight - no more than 7 cars per train plus the locomotive, banning of locomotives with certain cosmetic features, and all future rolling stock purchases have to be registered with the state police.

In all seriousness... thoughts to the families of the deceased and quick recovery for the injured. As others have pointed out before, being on a curve, and how far some of the equipment is from track 2 - sounds like excessive speed.

I thought MN had some sort of PTC system in place - but looks like it's still being developed.

[Tommy Meehan]

Amtrak Empire Service is suspended right now with no estimate on when it can be resumed. It does look however, as Metro-North gets the situation under control, they might be able to let Amtrak resume running. The accident and track damage appears to be just south of the Amtrak interchange.

[lirr42]

I thought MN had some sort of PTC system in place - but looks like it's still being developed.

There is an ASC/Cab Signalling system in place on MNCR. It's not as proactive as PTC would be, but it's not going to let the train do 150 without chiming in.

[pnaw10]

More proof of media not knowing what they are talking about: WNBC-TV's Chopper 4 reporter was drawing arrows over live footage of the tracks, showing what he thought was a "switch" between the tracks, and speculating that maybe the train was changing tracks just before it derailed. This was based entirely on seeing the locomotive so far off track 2, in the gap between tracks 2 and 3.

In fact, the bird's eye view of Bing Maps shows there is no switch between tracks there. Here's a screen shot:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BaaeqVXCUAAHu5Z.png:large

I also checked the old MNRRTrackMap that used to be circulated here (it's no longer online, but I saved a copy when it was still around) which confirms a speed limit change from 75 to 30 just before the curve (heading southbound) and no interlockings between tracks on the curve.

[lirr42]

Amtrak is reporting that they will be restoring Empire Service trains between New York and Albany shortly.

[25Hz]

Can you imagine being at the station and seeing this happen? In all the photos the end of the platform is right there within clear view of at least the tail end of the incident.

Glad to hear about empire service trains moving again soon.

[Terminal Proceed]

OK folks time for me to weigh in. After consulting with Jeff Smith by phone this morning - here are the guidelines for this thread. There will be NO speculation permitted as to the cause of the incident that is not based on FACT. This thread is ONLY to be utilized for the topic at hand. The merits of various train control apparatus, and/or push-pull operations are NOT topics for discussion in this thread. If you want to discuss these topics open a new thread. This thread will be monitored VERY closely - knuckle-headed behavior and statements will NOT be tolerated. Let the Federal agencies with jurisdiction conduct their investigations and when they establish the cause it will be published officially.

We don't want to have to lock this down so please police yourselves so we don't have to. I encourage all readers to report anything which they think is inappropriate and Jeff and I will handle it. DO NOT ENGAGE IN FLAMING WARS.

I have already cleaned up certain comments not specifically germane to this incident. If yours was one that was deleted, don't take it personally and DON'T re-post a comment that has been deleted.

Thank You All

Kevin

[ACeInTheHole]

Understood Terminal. Thank you.

[pumpers]

Amtrak is reporting that they will be restoring Empire Service trains between New York and Albany shortly.

I can't find this on the Amtrak website -still just a 10:10 service alert that all is on hold for the time being. JS

[BenH]

The Daily News just posted a large set of pictures from the scene --

"4 dead, 68 injured after NYC-bound Metro-North passenger train derails in Bronx"
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc ... -1.1533963
By Joe Stepansky, Pete Donohue, Edgar Sandoval, Caitlin Nolan, Joel Landau and Tina Moore
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

[lirr42]

Mr. Pumpers, a tweet issued by @Amtrak at 11:48am this morning brought the news.

[Train2703]

Don't MetroNorth trains have emergency lights? News reports were making it sound like they didn't