Normal rush hour expected after LIRR derailment

BY STEVE RITEA AND JOHN VALENTI | steve.ritea@newsday.com
john.valenti@newsday.com

7:18 AM EDT, March 28, 2008

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The morning after two trains collided at a switching area at Jamaica Station causing a massive disruption in service throughout the system, the Long Island Rail Road is operating on or close to schedule Friday, a railroad official said.

Which is good news for commuters, who suffered through endless evening rush-hour delays Thursday, hours after the trains collided -- and one derailed -- in Jamaica.

A crane lifted the derailed train back onto the tracks and it was towed to a repair facility shortly after 10 p.m. Thursday. Railroad spokesman Joe Calderone said scores of workers were working overnight to repair tracks that were damaged in the accident. Railroad officials have not yet detailed the extent of that damage.

No injuries were reported in the incident, which occurred at about 10 a.m. just west of the platform at Jamaica. Fire Department spokesman Chris Villarroel described it as a "minor, low-impact collision."

The crash occurred when the second-to-last car on a Hempstead-bound train that left Flatbush Avenue at 9:35 a.m. derailed and struck the last car of a 9:34 a.m. train from Penn Station to Huntington.

One of the passenger cars was passing over a switch, a mechanism controlled in towers near the station that allows trains to transfer between tracks, at the time of the accident, Calderone said.

Of the 290 passengers on the two trains, the fire department said it evaluated 20 passengers for injuries and found none.

Calderone said there were 150 passengers on the Hempstead train and 140 on the Huntington train.

Nineteen passengers were evacuated from the last two cars of the Hempstead train, which were not aligned with the platform, Calderone said. There were no passengers in the last car of the Huntington train, he said.

The Federal Railroad Administration confirmed it had investigators on the scene Thursday -- and said the cause of the collision is under investigation.

On Thursday, railroad officials were working to get information from a data recorder, similar to the "black box" found on airplanes, to learn more about how and why the accident occurred.

The speed of the trains at the time of the accident was unavailable, but Calderone said a 15 mph speed limit is in effect at the station.

At Penn Station and Jamaica during the Thursday evening rush, riders shuttled onto different trains after the LIRR canceled 11 eastbound trains that normally run between 4 and 6:30 p.m.

Announcements every minute or two at Penn Station caused passengers -- some in high heels -- to sprint for their track numbers, and LIRR employees wearing bright orange vests held thick schedules with modified train times.

Richard Thibodeau, 43, of Merrick, said he had just sent an e-mail message to his wife, who usually commutes home with him, to her BlackBerry, saying that he could not save her a seat.

"My 40-minute train will now take an-hour-and-a-half," said the operations manager for the insurance giant AIG. "It's the aggravation, it's the extra half-hour you don't plan on."

Others were more serene. "You take it in stride," said Justin Manger, 36, of Bellmore, who owns an executive search company in Manhattan. "It stinks, but it doesn't happen often and you deal with it."

At the Jamaica station, Susan Rhodes, 61, of Floral Park, a real estate agent in Brooklyn, was among the lucky ones: She was delayed just six minutes after connecting there from Flatbush Avenue.

"Hopefully this is my train," she said as one pulled in at 5 p.m. Noticing a familiar conductor, she checked to make sure the train was the one she wanted and stepped in. Within another minute, she was off.

Late Thursday afternoon, some 40 LIRR employees in orange vests were on the tracks near the Jamaica station looking at the derailed train and the track area surrounding it.

A long scrape could be seen on the side of the train car that was struck by the car that derailed.

The M-7 electric cars, which are self-insured by the LIRR, cost about $2.2 million apiece, railroad spokesman Salvatore Arena said.

On the platforms, LIRR employees, some with bullhorns, answered customers' questions and made announcements about train schedules.

This story was reported by Emerson Clarridge, Patrick Falby and Sarah Portlock and staff writers Steve Ritea and Nia-Malika Henderson.