Horrible news from South Carolina this morning. If America is going to have a passenger rail system, we have to do much better than this. Via The State: A crash involving an Amtrak passenger train and a freight train in Cayce, South Carolina, left at least two people dead and more than 50 injured. Pine Ridge train incident update: @CountyLex confirms two fatalities, more than 50 injured transported to the hospital. Shelter for passengers open at Pine Ridge Middle School. Media update @SCEMD at 6:30 a.m. #alert
It would appear that something is seriously wrong with the way passenger rail is operating in the United States under the federal corporation AMTRAK. This crash is the third fatal AMTRAK crash since the AMTRAK Cascades train derailed in Washington State at the cost of 3 lives and 62 passenger injuries only 49 days ago. Last Wednesday’s crash in Virginia of a train carrying Congressional Republicans to a retreat killed one. And now, the South Carolina crash has killed at least two. Each of these three accidents had a separate, probably preventable cause, though of course official verdicts await formal proceedings. READ MORE
