Workers for the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority were barred from obtaining recertifications due to COVID-19 and problems with trains, as top agency officers prioritized a return to service over safety, a new internal investigation shows.
More than 70 Metro workers were pulled from the ranks in mid-May when it was found nearly half of the agency’s 500 rail operators were missing refresher training after being given exemptions in 2020, the inquiry showed. Trainings were suspended twice, once in 2020 due to the pandemic and again in 2021 after problems were detected with metro cars, investigators found. Although it’s typically required to inform all departments within the agency to make such a decision, top operations officials suspended training sessions without seeking input, the investigation said.
DC COMMUTERS TO EXPERIENCE MORE DELAYS AS TRAIN OPERATORS ARE PULLED FROM RETRAINING
The revelations sparked criticism from several Metro board members who said they were unaware these waivers were being granted, as the agency seeks to shift its priorities to focus on safety.
“This is the one issue that has really resonated across the board in terms of riders, our funding jurisdictions, everyone,” said Board Chairman Paul Smedberg during a Safety and Operations Committee meeting on Thursday. “I actually found the report pretty disturbing that there was such a breakdown when it came to this. … I hope the people that were part of it understand how really bad this was and how bad it looked.”
Recertification allows train operators to be refreshed on policies and procedures and provides for evaluations of drivers to ensure safety. Operations management typically spearheads this process but ran into problems during the COVID-19 pandemic because it was no longer feasible to conduct training while maintaining social distancing. As a result, the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority issued waivers that allowed operators to postpone their training until further notice.
Although these waivers were meant to stop being distributed by the end of 2020, there “were no checks and balances in place to ensure waivers did not extend beyond a reasonable time frame, typically 30 days,” Metro spokeswoman Sherri Ly told the Washington Post in May.
The agency resumed limited training in September 2020, but it halted those once again in October 2021 after 60% of its 7000 series cars, the latest and most advanced train model, were pulled from the tracks after a derailment revealed a defect with the fleet’s axles. At that time, Metro issued another slate of blanket waivers.
Metro leaders initially argued the pause in safety training was necessary because the 7000 series cars are used in the training courses. However, the investigation found the rail car suspension did not prohibit the fleet from being used in training.
“There was no need to suspend the training due to any external action,” said Metro Chief Safety Officer Theresa Impastato. “The decision appears to have been made in terms of prioritizing the resources of the operations team.”
That decision to halt training in October 2021 did not comply with the metro’s risk management policies, nor did the operations leaders seek the input of the agency’s Executive Safety Council or the Rail Safety Standards Committee, Impastato said.
“What I’m hearing is that decision was wrong, and the only reason that at the time no one pointed out that it was wrong is because a limited number of people even knew the decision had been made,” said Metro board member Tracy Hadden Loh.
Metro leaders will begin seeking ways to add a checks and balance system for its training and certification requirements, as well as streamline supervision to fall under one department, Impastato said Thursday. Each division is responsible for individually supervising its department.
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The D.C. Metro has dealt with several safety concerns over the years, including derailments, collisions, and injuries. There were at least two derailments that occurred during the period the agency granted exemptions from recertification training, including one instance in July 2020, when a red-line train derailed at a station in Maryland, and another in October 2021, when a blue-line train derailed in a tunnel between Rosslyn and Arlington Cemetery.
The second incident prompted the 7000 series trains to be pulled from commission for inspection, and no injuries were reported in either instance.
