By Mark Bellune

markbellune@yahoo.com

Human error caused a fatal Cayce head-on train collision Feb. 4, 2018.

That was the ruling of the National Transportation Safety Board Tuesday morning.

An Amtrak passenger train collided head-on with a stationary CSX freight train on a Cayce siding early that morning.

It killed the engineer and conductor and sent 92 people to local hospitals.

The NTSB ruled that a “hand throw switch” on the main line diverted the Amtrak train onto an axillary track where the freight train was parked.

“The Amtrak train went into emergency braking; its speed decreased from 57 mph to a last-recorded speed of 53 mph,” according to Robert Sumwalt of the the NTSB. 

“The Amtrak train collided head-on with the CSX train at about 2:27 in the morning.

"A switch was left so that any train coming down the main track would strike a standing train.

“Year in and year out, improperly lined switches lead to a steady procession of accidents.”

“... the risk persists to this day unmitigated. This is despite a history of recommendations on the part of this Board, including urgent recommendation made as recently as last year.”

The NTSB also said “recommendations will require action by several parties, including the regulator.

"It is time for railroads to eliminate the possibility of employees failing to perform critical tasks such as lining a switch."

The NTSB also pointed to a misaligned switch as the cause of the fatal train accident in Graniteville near Aiken Jan. 6, 2005. 2 Norfolk Southern trains collided near the Avondale Mills plant.

9 people were killed and more than 250 people were treated for toxic chlorine exposure. 

Sumwalt said, “In the wake of a 2005 switching accident in Graniteville, SC, the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) issued an emergency order calling for more training about switching errors, and providing for fines to punish such errors. Part of the documentation for the order was a Switch Position Awareness Form (SPAF), which CSX required the crew in Cayce to fill out when they realigned switches" daylight or darkness.

The NTSB recommended federal regulators order better automation and lighting in switching areas.

“The NTSB did not believe that more training or stiffer punishments would eliminate the type of error we saw in Graniteville...”