(The following story by Steve Ritea appeared on the Newsday website on February 21.)
NEW YORK — The Long Island Rail Road was ill-prepared to deal with two incidents that led to major shutdowns and affected more than 100,000 riders for hours, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority inspector general said in a report issued Thursday.
In the months since, the railroad made efforts to improve communication with customers and within the agency, Inspector General Barry Kluger said in the review of several incidents last winter.
“During normal operations, minor disruptions, or planned disruptions … the LIRR appears able to manage the internal communication needs required to deal with the situation,” the report says. “However, during a sudden, large-scale disruption, this is not the case.”
In a February 2007 episode involving a power shutdown, some 400 passengers jumped off several dark trains stranded on the tracks near Valley Stream. Train crews said they had difficulty getting information from LIRR headquarters to pass along to passengers.
Passengers on one train “were upset, becoming disorderly in attempting to leave the train. Some were even described as belligerent,” the report says. “Recorded transmissions captured the conductor’s description of a volatile situation in which riders activated ‘fireman’s pulls’ to open doors and warned the conductor to ‘stay out of their way’ when he attempted to stop the evacuations.”
Michael Schwartz, 45, of Bellmore, an attorney among those who jumped off a train that night, recalled Thursday, “Everyone was crazed, not because we weren’t getting information, but because they [LIRR employees] didn’t know what they were doing.”
The LIRR has responded with a variety of efforts. The agency is preparing to distribute cell phones with text-messaging ability to 1,000 crew members and has established a public information office adjacent to the railroad’s nerve center in Jamaica. The railroad also is planning to have staff on-site 24 hours a day to send e-mail alerts to customers.
LIRR President Helena Williams called Kluger’s report “the catalyst for the LIRR to dramatically improve its response to service disruptions.”
The Long Island Power Authority and MTA Police, also criticized in the report, have taken similar measures designed to improve communications or better coordinate staff. LIPA also said it has inspected its entire system using aerial photography and has completed at least 100 repairs and replacements, with another $3 million in infrastructure improvements planned this year along LIRR routes.
The report covered five incidents in January and February of 2007, focusing primarily on two.
The first, during the Jan. 5, 2007, rush hour, occurred in Rego Park when neighborhood resident Ari Kraft, 13, was struck and killed by a train while painting graffiti on a railroad signal box.
More than 6,500 passengers on six trains were stranded when trains were stopped. Response was delayed because railroad officials were not given an exact location, only told it was “just west of Forest Hills.”
“Every responder interviewed first reported to the Forest Hills Station, climbed to the station platform, looked westward and saw nothing,” the report says.
Plans to send a foreman to the scene by train also led to delays when “LIRR officials realized … could not get to the scene by scheduled train, since no trains were running,” the report says.
On Feb. 2, 2007, about 400 passengers jumped off several LIRR trains after an electrical wire was downed over the tracks near Valley Stream, leaving 5,000 passengers stranded on 14 trains.
Up to four officers were sent to the scene, but “greatly outnumbered [by riders], officers abandoned their efforts to dissuade evacuees from leaving the train and instead decided to assist customers” by clearing the area around the tracks.
The incident ultimately caused 107 trains to be delayed or canceled that evening, affecting 38,000 customers.
Inadequate staffing contributed to problems that night, the report found.