http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-la-trainsep15,0,6227341.story
Texting eyed in fatal train collision
Dispatcher tried, too late, to stop engineer
By Louis Sahagun and Ted Rohrlich | Tribune Newspapers
September 15, 2008
LOS ANGELES — Federal investigators continued to comb the twisted wreckage of a commuter train in Los Angeles on Sunday, as fresh details emerged that a Metrolink dispatcher tried too late to warn the engineer he was about to collide with a freight train.
Investigators also were checking reports that the engineer was text messaging before the crash.
Kitty Higgins, a board member for the National Transportation Safety Board, said her agency is talking with two teens who told KCBS-TV that they received a text message from the engineer at 4:22 p.m. Friday, just moments before the deadly crash.
The station showed a text message apparently signed by the engineer.
Higgins says that the engineer's cell phone was not recovered at the crash site.
The Friday rush-hour crash has so far claimed 25 lives.
Metrolink officials on Saturday said their train's engineer apparently failed to heed a red light.
But Higgins criticized Metrolink's statement, adding, "We really work very hard not to jump to conclusions."
Regular riders on the route said the Metrolink train often stops at the junction to wait for a Union Pacific freight.
Friday, however, the Metrolink train continued north before the freight train had passed, tripping an alarm at the dispatch center.
A Metrolink dispatcher called the train and reached the conductor, according to a Metrolink spokesman.
But by then, the crash had already occurred on the curve leading west, killing the engineer.
Metrolink spokesman Francisco Oaxaca said officials were investigating what triggered the alarm.
Eleven investigators for the National Transportation Safety Board were working on the accident.
Please, leave the texting to the kids. Atleast while your running a train
So when do we find out that this was a terrorist attack and we need to start screening all bus drivers, train engineers and pilots before THEY can get on board?
Never, it wasn't. It wasn't spectacular enough this was simply an accident
Well obviously the terrorists have taken over the cell phone network and they spoofed a message to the engineer at just the right time for him to not see the red light, causing the train to crash and kill innocent Americans! Why? BECAUSE THEY HATE FREEDOM!!!!11!ONE
We have the technology now that allows vehicles to travel through the air at hundreds of miles per hour and fly themselves under almost complete automation.
Apparently, we have the technology to trip an alarm when a train runs a red light.
But we haven't implemented a simple little system that just locks up the brakes on a train when that alarm is triggered? What the berkeley?
This being posted while Wally is in the middle of his shift.
See, it's possible to not only text, but search on line, and post to your favorite board.... 
Wally- watch out for that taxi!!! OH, barely missed...
E-
I assumed taxis were fair game.
Nope, with the fact that airplanes and subways are prime terror targets, Most terrorists uses taxis to kill with car bombs, I figure what better than a bus to put a moon sized crater in New York, right?
Tin foil hat... check
Turning off computer... check
Looking for black helicopter... check
confuZion3 wrote:
....But we haven't implemented a simple little system that just locks up the brakes on a train when that alarm is triggered? What the berkeley?
Apparently they do have systems like that, just a bit expensive to implement and passenger trains haven't exactly been big money makers in the past 10-20 years.
The thing I find ridiculous is quite the opposite. Now that this crash has occurred the CA legislature is now demanding that such a system be put in place. This apparently is to prevent the rash of head-on collisions of trains ignoring signals. Oh wait, they almost never happen.
Reactionary B.S. Not saying such a system would not be good, but going all ape s#$t about it when a very rare event happens seems a bit silly.
Kalifornia is now also making noises about banning cell phone use by train engineers. I'd like to take this a step further: capital punishment for an accident proven to have been caused by cell phone or PDA use or texting while driving.
Of course, if they hit me or mine the gubmint might not even have to get involved. 
Jensenman wrote:
Kalifornia is now also making noises about banning cell phone use by train engineers. I'd like to take this a step further: capital punishment for an accident proven to have been caused by cell phone or PDA use or texting while driving.
Of course, if they hit me or mine the gubmint might not even have to get involved.
Exemptions for law enforcement of course. Have you SEEN the inside of a patrol car lately? Its like a mobile command center in there.
Edit-I of course only see the interiors of patrol cars during law abiding activities.
Like when he narcs out minors for drinking... good thing he doesn't live in a college town.
John Brown wrote:
Like when he narcs out minors for drinking... good thing he doesn't live in a college town.
Listen here, after a hard day shoveling coal, miners deserve a beer! Why would you narc on them?
I remember the Gainesville Coal Mines when I went to school there. The toughest part was getting the gators to pull the carts
