Name: How to Prevent Train Crashes
Uploaded: undefined
Duration: undefined

NOVA

Carlisle Companies

Viking

NOVA Science Trust Logo

<div class="rich-text">Could a safety technology have prevented a train crash in Washington that killed three?
</div>

Could a safety technology have prevented a train crash in Washington that killed three?

How to Prevent Train Crashes

<div class="rich-text">Could a safety technology have prevented a train crash in Washington that killed three?</div>

Tech & Engineering

<div class="rich-text"><h3>
 How to Prevent Train Crashes
</h3>

 Published January 3, 2018



 Onscreen
 
 : On December 18, 2017, an Amtrak train rocketed around a curve near Tacoma, WA.



 Steven Ditmeyer
 
 : Centrifugal forces knocked the train off the track.



 Onscreen
 
 : It derailed on an overpass, killing 3 and injuring nearly 100. The speed limit on that curve was 30 mph. The train was going 80 mph.



 Ditmeyer
 
 : Positive train control (PTC) would have prevented this kind of an accident.



 Sarah Feinberg
 
 : PTC is a technology that takes over control of the locomotive.



 Onscreen
 
 : Here’s how this automatic failsafe works. The speed restrictions on a train’s route are loaded onto an onboard computer. Along with any temporary speed changes due to construction, track work, incapacitated trains. That gives the train a set of maximum speeds. GPS calculates the train’s position and speed.



 Ditmeyer
 
 : A train that exceeds its speed at any point—there’s an automatic application of the brakes to slow it down.



 Onscreen
 
 : Sound Transit, Amtrak, and BNSF Railway installed PTC on the route where the accident occurred. But it wasn’t in operation because testing was incomplete. If PTC had been functional, it may have prevented the derailment. By law, all passenger rail lines will be required to have PTC installed by the end of 2018.
</div>

United States

Northern Mariana Islands

Puerto Rico

American Samoa

Guam

U.S. Virgin Islands

U.S. Minor Outlying Islands

US & Territories

Colossal explosions shake a remote corner of the Siberian tundra, leaving behind massive craters. In Alaska, a huge lake erupts with bubbles of inflammable gas. Scientists are discovering that these mystifying phenomena add up to a ticking time bomb, as long-frozen permafrost melts and releases vast amounts of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. What are the implications of these dramatic developments in the Arctic? Scientists and local communities alike are struggling to grasp the scale of the methane threat and what it means for our climate future. (Premiered February 2, 2022)

In the Arctic, enormous releases of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, threaten the climate.

Arctic Sinkholes

The top half of Jupiter in blue and green against a night sky

A composite image of Jupiter using images captured by the James Webb Space Telescope. Image Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, Jupiter ERS Team; image processing by Judy Schmidt.

Explore the cosmos, delve into ancient history, and follow an extreme rescue with NOVA’s most-watched documentaries released in 2022.

NOVA’s most popular science documentaries of 2022

Four bright orange loops brand off of a dark blue blob

A transmission electron micrograph of HIV-1 virus particles (orange) replicating from the plasma membrane of an infected H9 T cell. Credit: NIAID, Flickr

Scientists have cured a handful of people of HIV by piggybacking on treatments they received for blood cancer. But does that bring a widespread cure any closer?

Transcript

Credits

Support Provided By