The National Transportation Safety Board has launched an investigation into a Caltrain crash that injured at least 13 people Thursday morning in San Bruno and disrupted train service until further notice, according to officials.
The federal agency, which conducts independent investigations into significant transportation collisions, had employees at the scene Friday investigating the circumstances around why a Caltrain struck one of its own agency’s on-track maintenance vehicles.
Just before 10:40 a.m. Thursday, southbound train #506, which was carrying about 75 passengers, hit a Caltrain electrification maintenance vehicle near Scott Street, according to Caltrain spokesperson Jeremy Lipps.
The train operator, four train passengers and the driver of the electrification vehicle were taken to a hospital with injuries that weren’t considered life-threatening. An additional seven people were treated at the scene, Lipps said. Emergency personnel reported to the scene and trains were held on both tracks. Images of the collision were circulated widely on social media, depicting the front of the train engulfed in flames.
Caltrain said Friday that it had not yet come to any conclusions on why the equipment was on the tracks during the collision. The agency plans to start repairing the tracks and restoring service after the federal safety board wraps up its investigation at the scene.
“Obviously, the truck shouldn’t have been there,” Lipps said. “Why it was there — we don’t know.”
The NTSB shared additional details about the crash and its investigation at a news conference Friday. The Caltrain was traveling at 60 mph, 19 under the maximum speed limit, when it slammed into a train of construction work vehicles consisting of one pickup truck and two flatbed trucks with cranes, said NTSB Vice Chairman Bruce Landsberg. It took the locomotive 500 feet from the point of impact to come to a stop.
“They are all in one big jumble,” Landsberg said about the vehicles. “You won’t even see what’s left of the first truck.”
The train operator applied full braking and blew the horn to warn the construction workers, Landsberg said. He estimated they had just a “few seconds” to get out of the way.
“A real effort made on the part of the Caltrain engineer,” he said. “Fortunately they were able to get out of the way because if anybody would have stayed there, they would not have survived.”
Positive train control – a system designed to prevent train-to-train collisions – was on at the time of the crash. Landsberg said the NTSB is determined to figure out what went wrong.
It could take the agency more than a year to issue a final report with the findings of its investigation and recommendations to prevent a similar crash in the future, Landsberg said.
“There’s a lot of layers to the onion here and that’s why we want to spend time looking into this,” he said.
One piece of evidence – an outward-facing camera on the Caltrain – will be instrumental in the investigation, Landsberg said.
The NTSB plans to finish gathering physical evidence in the next 12 to 24 hours, said John Manutez, the investigator in charge.
Caltrain first broke ground on an electrification project in 2017, but the pandemic disrupted supply chains and caused delays with train manufacturer Stadler, which is building Caltrain’s fleet of 133 new train cars in Salt Lake City and Switzerland. Electrifying the tracks will allow Caltrain to operate additional trains during peak hours and provide more consistent service, according to the agency. It is expected to be completed in late 2024.
As the investigation into the collision continues, Caltrain passengers should expect delays.
Caltrain will be operating a modified schedule until further notice, with SamTrans providing a bus-bridge service between South San Francisco and Millbrae stations, according to the agency. Caltrain is running 69 trains instead of the regular 104-train schedule. BART will also be providing free service for people transferring at Millbrae Station.
The rail agency has temporarily stopped work on its electrification project to “ensure that all appropriate safety protocols are in place” before the work resumes, according to a news release.
At the time of Thursday’s crash, Stanford University professor Jesse Miller was seated on the train, working on his laptop during his morning commute when there was a large “bump” — what he believed was the train colliding with the equipment. The train brakes slammed hard, causing his laptop to fall onto the floor, and several people fell out of their seats, he said.
Miller had seen electrification equipment near the tracks over the last several years and believes the on-track equipment caught on fire from the fuel tank and then caught the train on fire. There was also a line of flames underneath the train, believed to be ignited by fuel dripping onto the tracks, he said.
“Within the same second or so, there was a fireball outside my seat,” he said. “All I could see was fire.”
Miller quickly got out of his seat and started moving through the train. Since the doors were still closed, some passengers opened emergency exit windows and jumped out. Miller waited briefly until the conductor showed up, instructing them to move to the north side of the train and exit through the door. The crash took place near a construction area, not at a station.
Miller said he saw several passengers with minor injuries and a construction worker, who “looked pretty scraped up,” get loaded into an ambulance.
“It’s really a miracle that no one had life-threatening injuries,” he said.
Craziest #Caltrain ride ever. I think everyone got off the train safely pic.twitter.com/XWTnJVynRj
— Jesse Miller (@Texosporium) March 10, 2022
San Bruno Fire Department, which responded to the crash, said that there were twenty-five units at the scene with a total of 60 personnel responding to the incident.
“Our deepest thoughts and sympathies are with all those who were injured,” said Caltrain Acting Executive Director Michelle Bouchard in a statement Thursday. “Caltrain’s core values have always prioritized the safety of our passengers, employees and the communities we serve, and we are deeply disappointed that those standards were not met.” Bouchard said that the agency was “committed to working closely with the NTSB and other regulators to determine the cause” of the incident.