(The following story by Steve Orr and Greg Livadas was posted on the Democrat and Chronicle website on February 5.)
ROCHESTER, N.Y. — CSX officials admitted Wednesday that warning signals at a train crossing in Henrietta were faulty prior to a crash that claimed two motorists? lives Tuesday morning.
John O’Connor, 78, and his wife, Jean, 75, of Henrietta died when they drove across the tracks on South Winton Road near the Brighton border in front of a freight train. Witnesses said the crossing gates had not come down, although warning lights apparently were flashing.
“There were activation malfunctions of the warning devices for Winton Road,” said CSX spokesman Bob Sullivan. “As a result of that, instructions were given for trains to stop at that crossing.”
Sullivan would not comment on more specifics, including the speed of the train as it crossed Winton Road, until an investigation is completed.
“The investigation is progressing,” Sullivan said. “We don’t have everything yet, so we can’t really speak to what transpired. We recognize there is a lot of interest and concern. We share those concerns.”
Sullivan said he could not estimate when more details would be given.
“We’re moving as quickly as we can but also have to be very thorough,” he said.
Meanwhile, federal railroad investigators are scrutinizing CSX’s response to reported persistent problems at the crossing. Witnesses said they had repeatedly called authorities about malfunctioning gates at the site in recent weeks.
And Monroe County sheriff’s officials said Wednesday that deputies had been dispatched there for gate problems at least nine times since October. Two separate complaints were made on Jan. 27 about gates stuck in the down position, said sheriff’s spokesman Deputy John Helfer.
Officials from the Federal Railroad Administration, which is leading the investigation, were on the scene Tuesday and Wednesday and were attempting to verify the reports of repeated problems, said spokesman Warren Flatau.
He also said the agency was examining CSX’s response to the reports of trouble. “That is certainly a matter that we’re looking into, as a number of regulations that we enforce have bearing on that,” Flatau said.
He said the FRA’s rules lay out in detail how a railroad must respond if crossing equipment malfunctions; some rules, for instance, dictate that extra precautions must be taken if crossing safety equipment is not considered reliable.
According to guidelines issued by the Northeast Operating Rules Advisory Committee, an organization of railroads of which CSX is a member, signal malfunctions at train crossings require the train’s crew to stop and provide on-ground warnings to motorists before the train may cross. Partial crossing activations require trains not to exceed 15 mph, unless there is a flagger or police officer to give warnings on each side of the tracks.
CSX’s adherence to those rules “is part of what the folks on the ground are looking at,” Flatau said.
He said FRA investigators had been reviewing maintenance records and inspecting the crossing equipment. Some crossing equipment now has built-in recording devices that would reveal whether the gates and lights functioned properly, though Flatau said he did not know if the South Winton Road crossing was so equipped.
Flatau said agency records going back to 1975 indicate this was the first reported vehicle accident at that crossing.
The CSX train was pulling 45 freight cars on an eastbound run from Buffalo to Albany, CSX officials said Tuesday. They said they did not know how fast the train was traveling at the time of the collision, which spun the O’Connor’s car around and crumpled it. The speed limit for trains in the area of the crossing is 50 mph, according to FRA data.
The Henrietta crossing was not the only rail crossing troubling local officials Wednesday. A train crossing on Pixley Road in Gates malfunctioned Tuesday and again Wednesday, said Gates Police Chief Tom Roche. Protective gates normally lowered when trains approach were stuck when no train was near, he said.
In one instance on Tuesday, after the fatal crash in Henrietta, the gates did not close when a train approached, Roche said.
Roche said police had to be stationed at the crossing for hours on Tuesday and Wednesday to allow traffic to pass or to divert cars until a crew from CSX could be on scene to operate the gates.
“We notify CSX, whose response time is rather unacceptable to us,” Roche said. “We’re asking them to find a better way to deal with their malfunctions and the problems they cause. Either staff it or fix it.”
CSX has been prominent in Rochester-area news since a Dec. 23, 2001, crash of one of its trains on River Street in Charlotte. The wreck, which toppled 23 rail cars just 100 feet from the Genesee River, shot a fireball into the air and spilled an estimated 14,000 gallons of solvents onto land or into the river.
The company finished the land phase of the cleanup in 2002, extracting about 28,000 tons of contaminated soil from a plot the size of a football field.
CSX expects to finish the water phase in late May by dredging about one-third of an acre of river bottom. The plan still needs state regulatory approval.
The 2001 accident, traced to brakes improperly set by a CSX conductor, caused one minor injury but spawned at least four lawsuits.