Lewis & Tompkins Blog

NTSB Urges “Safety Redundancy” After Washington Train Accident

In its ongoing investigation of the fatal Washington Metro crash in June, the National Transportation Safety Board has become concerned that the DC train accident could have been prevented if the Washington Metro concentrated more on adequate safety redundancy.

According to the Washington Post and the NTSB, a single malfunction caused the train accident that killed nine commuters and injured dozens more. The fact that a single failure in the largely automatic train system is extremely troubling to many - as a lack of safety redundancy puts only one broken part between a safe commute and another tragic metro accident. The NTSB will probably officially announce that a new software system that regularly checks on hardware functionality should be required. The new system would "continuously evaluate the validity of real-time track occupancy data."

The NTSB does not expect to officially finish its investigation of the DC commuter train wreck for several more months.