RobotRisk Autonomous Systems Incident & Risk Register
RobotRisk / Alstom Signaling Inc. / 2009-06-22

Fort Totten crash traced to failed GRS/Alstom Signaling track circuit module

S5 · 06/22
2009 · 16:58 · Alstom Signaling Inc. · Washington, DC, USA

Record

CompanyAlstom Signaling Inc.
Categoryrail supplier
Typefatality
Date06/22
2009
Time of day16:58
LocationWashington, DC, USA · Fort Totten station
SeverityS5 (fatality or catastrophic loss)
Scale1 failed track circuit module / systemwide ATC design
Confidencehigh
VerificationYes - adversarially checked against the cited source
SourceNTSB

What happened

NTSB found the probable cause of the fatal WMATA Fort Totten Red Line collision was a track circuit module manufactured by GRS/Alstom Signaling that suffered parasitic oscillations and failed to detect a stopped train, causing the automatic train control system to allow a following train to collide with it; 9 dead, 80 injured.

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S1S2S3S4S5

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