railroad safety News

Freight Railroads Ask Courts to Throw Out Rule Requiring Two-Person Crews on Trains

Four railroads have asked federal appeals courts to throw out a new rule that would require two-person train crews in most circumstances, saying the mandate is arbitrary, capricious and an illegal abuse of discretion. The identical challenges of the Federal …

Freight Railroads Must Keep 2-Person Crews Under New Federal Rule

Major freight railroads will have to maintain two-person crews on most routes under a new federal rule that was finalized Tuesday in a milestone in organized labor’s long fight to preserve the practice. The Transportation Department’s Federal Railroad Administration released …

Automated Braking Would Not Have Prevented Pennsylvania Train Crash

The collision of three Norfolk Southern trains in Pennsylvania early this month highlights the shortcomings of the automated braking system that was created to prevent such crashes. None of the circumstances the National Transportation Safety Board described Tuesday in its …

Buttigieg Scolds Railroads for Not Doing More to Improve Safety Since Ohio Derailment

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg has reiterated his concerns about railroad safety and scolded the industry for not doing more to improve since last year’s fiery Ohio derailment. In a new letter to the freight railroads’ main trade group, Buttigieg acknowledged …

Three Trains in Collision and Derailment in Pennsylvania; No Injuries Reported

Authorities say three trains were involved in a collision and derailment in eastern Pennsylvania on Saturday morning that caused no reported injuries or evacuations but left some railroad cars scattered along a riverbank and at least one partially in the …

Long Island Rail Road Employee Falsified Inspection Report Before Derailment

A former employee of the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) pleaded guilty to falsely claiming he had inspected a part of a railway that an investigation determined was broken and contributed to a collision in Speonk, New York in 2019. …

Rail Whistleblowers Fired for Voicing Safety Concerns

Hours before a Norfolk Southern train derailed in Ohio and erupted in fire in February, a judge ruled a former railroad employee could proceed with a lawsuit claiming he had been harassed for years by managers who said he reported …

Norfolk Southern Falls Short of Safety Standards, Say Federal Regulators

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) – Norfolk Southern made improvements after one of its trains derailed, caught fire and spilled toxic chemicals near an Ohio town, but the company is nowhere near the “gold standard for safety” it is striving to be, …

Federal Regulators Promise Safety Review at all the Major Freight Railroads

The Federal Railroad Administration recently completed a review of Norfolk Southern’s safety culture in the wake of the February’s fiery derailment in Ohio, and officials plan to follow up with similar investigations of all the major freight railroads over the …

Ohio Train Derailment Illuminates Waste Disposal Predicament

When word surfaced that soils and liquids laced with chemicals from the East Palestine, Ohio, train derailment were being sent to southeastern Michigan for storage, local residents and politicians were livid. “People were seeing pictures of what happened in Ohio …