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3/1/2023
The National Transportation Safety Board yesterday opened the public docket for its ongoing investigation into the 2021 derailment of a Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority train in Arlington, Virginia.
The accident occurred Oct. 21, 2021, when a wheelset on rail car 7200 derailed while traveling southbound on WMATA's Blue Line between the Rosslyn and Arlington Cemetery stations. Of the 187 passengers onboard, one passenger was transported to the hospital for treatment; no other injuries were reported.
NTSB previously issued a safety alert calling on U.S. transit-rail agencies and commuter railroads to assess their fleets for wheelsets that do not meet gage specifications and to take immediate action to correct the problem.
NTSB's public docket release is providing a "road map" for WMATA's fleet restoration plan, WMATA officials said yesterday in a press release. The docket contains only factual information collected by NTSB investigators; it does not provide the final report or a probable cause for the derailment.
"We appreciate the NTSB making the technical reports available so that we can develop our plan to begin repressing wheels on these trains at a higher standard, including the fit onto the axles," said WMATA Chief Operations Officer Brian Dwyer. "We are preparing the technical documents and training plan, while we collaboratively advance the next version of our return-to-service plan for approval by the Washington Metrorail Safety Commission."